THE  CROWN  OF  WILD  OLIVE 


ALSO 

MUNERA  PULVERIS 
PRE-RAPHAEL1TISM— ARATRA  PENTELICI 
THE  ETHICS  OF  THE  DUST 
FICTION,  FAIR  AND  FOUL 
THE  ELEMENTS  OF  DRAWING 

BY 

JOHN  RUSKIN,  M.A. 

AUTHOR  OF  "THE  SEVEN   LAMPS  OF  ARCHITECTURE,"   u  THE  STONES  OF  VENICE," 
44  SESAME  AND  LILIES,"  ETC. 


BOSTON 
ALDINE  BOOK  PUBLISHING  CO. 

PUBLISHERS 


CONTENTS. 


Work, 


Traffic, 


War, 


THE  CROWN  OF  WILD  OLIVE. 

LECTURE  1. 
LECTURE  II. 
LECTURE  III. 


PAGE 
17 


44 


66 


MUNERA  PULVERIS. 


Preface, 

CHAP. 

I.  Definitions, 

II.  Store-Keeping, 

III.  Coin-Keeping, 

IV.  Commerce, 
V.  Government, 

VI.  Mastership,  . 
Aptendices, 


97 

in 

"5 
151 
170 
181 

204 

222 


PRE-RAPHAELITISM. 

PAGH 

PREEACE,  235 

Pre-Raphaelitism,       ......  237 

ARATRA  PENTELICI. 

Preface,         ......         .  283 

LECTURE 

I.    Of  the  Division  of  Arts,      ....  287 

II.    Idolatry,       .......  304 

III.  Imagination,       ......  322 

IV.  Likeness,       .......  350 

V.   Structure,         ......  372 

VI.    The  School  of  Athens,    .....  395 

The  Future  of  England,     .....  415 

Notes  on  Political  Economy  of  Prussia,     .         ,         .  435 


LIST  OF  ILLUSTRATIONS. 


ARATRA  PENTELICI. 


PLATES 

FACING 

PAGE 

I. 

Porch  of  San  Zenone.    Verona,     .  , 

300 

II. 

The  Arethusa  of  Syracuse, 

302 

III. 

The  Warning  to  the  Kings, 

302 

V. 

Tomb  of  the  Doges  Jacopo  and  Lorenzo  Tiepolo, 

333 

VI. 

Archaic  Athena  of  Athens  and  Corinth, 

VII. 

Archaic,  Central  and  Declining  Art  of  Greece, 

355 

VIII. 

The  Apollo  of  Syracuse  and  the  Self-made  Man, 

366 

IX. 

Apollo  Chrysocomes  of  Clazomence, 

368 

X. 

Marble  Masonry  in  the  Duoma  of  Verona, 

33i 

XI. 

The  First  Elements  of  Sculpture, 

382 

XII. 

Branch  of  Phillyrea.    Dark  Purple,  , 

39o 

XIII. 

Greek  Flat  Relief  and  Sculpture  by  Edged 

Incision,  ...... 

392 

XIV. 

Apollo  and  the  Python.    Heracles'  and  the 

Nemean  Lion,  ..... 

400 

XV. 

Hera  of  Argos.    Zeus  of  Syracuse, 

401 

XVI. 

Demeter  of  Messene.    Hera  of  Crossus,  . 

402 

PLATES  FACING  PAGE 

XVII.  Athena  of  Thurium.    Sereie  Ligeia  of  Terina,  402 

XVIII.  Artemis  of  Syracuse.    Hera  of  Lacinian  Cape,  404 

XIX.  Zeus  of  Messene.   Ajax  of  Opus,    .         .         .  405 

XX.  Greek  and  Barbarian  Sculpture,        .         .  407 

XXI.  The  Beginnings  of  Chivalry,         .         .         .  409 


FIGURE  PAGE 

1.  Specimen  of  Plate,         .....  293 

2.  Woodcut,          .......  323 

3.  Figure  on  Greek  Type  of  Vases.       .         .        w  326 

4.  Early  Drawing  of  the  Myth,  ....  330 
9.  Cut,  "Give  It  to  Me,"  .  332 
6-  Engraving  on  Coin,                              •  335 

7.  Drawing  of  Fish.    By  Turner,             .         a  36a 

8.  Iron  Bar,         .         ,...«•  379 

9.  Diagram  of  Leaf,           „        •        «        «        «  391 


CROWN  OF  WILD  OLIVE 

THREH  LECTURES  ON 

WORK,  TRAFFIC  AND  WAR 


PREFACE. 


Twenty  years  ago,  there  was  no  lovelier  piece  of  lowland 
scenery  in  South  England,  nor  any  more  pathetic  in  the  world, 
by  its  expression  of  sweet  human  character  and  life,  than  that 
immediately  bordering  on  the  sources  of  the  Wandle,  and  in- 
cluding the  lower  moors  of  Addington,  and  the  villages  of 
Beddington  and  Garshalton,  with  all  their  pools  and  streams. 
No  clearer  or  diviner  waters  ever  sang  with  constant  lips  of 
the  hand  which  '  giveth  rain  from  heaven  ; '  no  pastures  ever 
lightened  in  spring  time  with  more  passionate  blossoming  ; 
no  sweeter  homes  ever  hallowed  the  heart  of  the  passer-by 
with  their  pride  of  peaceful  gladness — fain-hidden — yet  fall- 
confessed.  The  place  remains,  or,  until  a  few  months  ago, 
remained,  nearly  unchanged  in  its  larger  features  ;  but,  with 
deliberate  mind  I  say,  that  I  have  never  seen  anything  so 
ghastly  in  its  inner  tragic  meaning, — not  in  Pisan  Maremma — 
not  by  Campagna  tomb, — not  by  the  sand-isles  of  the  Torcellan 
shore, — as  the  slow  stealing  of  aspects  of  reckless,  indolent, 
animal  neglect,  over  the  delicate  sweetness  of  that  English 
scene  :  nor  is  any  blasphemy  or  impiety — any  fmntic  saying  or 
godless  thought — more  appalling  to  me,  using  the  best  power  of 
judgment  I  have  to  discern  its  sense  and  scope,  than  the  insolent 
defilings  of  those  springs  by  the  human  herds  that  drink  of 
them.  Just  where  the  welling  of  stainless  water,  trembling  and 
pure,  like  a  body  of  light,  enters  the  pool  of  Garshalton,  cutting 
itself  a  radiant  channel  down  to  the  gravel,  through  warp  oi 
feathery  weeds,  all  waving,  which  it  traverses  with  its  deep 
threads  of  clearness,  like  the  chalcedony  in  moss-agate,  starred 
here  and  there  with  white  grenouillette  ;  just  in  the  very  rush 
and  murmur  of  the  first  spreading  currents,  the  human 


6 


PREFACE. 


wretches  of  the  place  cast  their  street  and  house  foulness ; 
heaps  of  dust  and  slime,  and  broken  shreds  of  old  metal,  and 
rags  of  putrid  clothes  ;  they  having  neither  energy  to  cart  it 
away,  nor  decency  enough  to  dig  it  into  the  ground,  thus  shed 
into  the  stream,  to  diffuse  what  venom  of  it  will  float  and 
melt,  far  away,  in  all  places  where  God  meant  those  waters  to 
bring  joy  and  health.  And,  in  a  little  pool,  behind  some 
houses  farther  in  the  village,  where  another  spring  rises,  the 
shattered  stones  of  the  well,  and  of  the  little  fretted  channel 
which  was  long  ago  built  and  traced  for  it  by  gentler  hands, 
lie  scattered,  each  from  each,  under  a  ragged  bank  of  mortar, 
and  scoria ;  and  bricklayers'  refuse,  on  one  side,  which  the 
clean  wTater  nevertheless  chastises  to  purity  ;  but  it  cannot 
conquer  the  dead  earth  beyond  ;  and  there,  circled  and  coiled 
under  festering  scum,  the  stagnant  edge  of  the  pool  effaces 
itself  into  a  slope  of  black  slime,  the  accumulation  of  indolent 
years.  Half-a-dozen  men,  with  one  day's  wTork,  could  cleanse 
those  pools,  and  trim  the  flowers  about  their  banks,  and  make 
every  breath  of  summer  air  above  them  rich  with  cool  balm  ; 
and  every  glittering  wTave  medicinal,  as  if  it  ran,  troubled  of 
angels,  from  the  porch  of  Bethesda.  But  that  days  work  is 
never  given,  nor  will  be  ;  nor  will  any  joy  be  possible  to  heart 
of  man,  for  evermore,  about  those  wells  of  English  waters. 

When  I  last  left  them,  I  walked  up  slowly  through  the  back 
streets  of  Croydon,  from  the  old  church  to  the  hospital ;  and, 
just  on  the  left,  before  coming  up  to  the  crossing  of  the  High 
Street,  there  was  a  new  public-house  built.  And  the  front  of 
it  was  built  in  so  wise  manner,  that  a  recess  of  two  feet  wras 
left  below  its  front  windows,  between  them  and  the  street- 
pavement — a  recess  too  narrow  for  any  possible  use  (for  even 
if  it  had  been  occupied  by  a  seat,  as  in  old  time  it  might  have 
been,  everybody  walking  along  the  street  would  have  fallen 
over  the  legs  of  the  reposing  wayfarers).  But,  by  way  of 
making  this  two  feet  depth  of  freehold  land  more  expressive 
of  the  dignity  of  an  establishment  for  the  sale  of  spirituous 
liquors,  it  was  fenced  from  the  pavement  by  an  imposing  iron 
railing,  having  four  or  five  spearheads  to  the  yard  of  it,  and 
&ix  feet  high  ;  containing  as  much  iron  and  iron- work,  indeed, 


PREFACE. 


7 


as  could  well  be  put  into  the  space ;  and  by  this  stately  ar* 
rangement,  the  little  piece  of  dead  ground  within,  between 
wall  and  street,  became  a  protective  receptacle  of  refuse ;  cigar 
ends,  and  oyster  shells,  and  the  like,  such  as  an  open-handed 
English  street-populace  habitually  scatters  from  its  presence, 
and  was  thus  left,  unsweepable  by  any  ordinary  methods. 
Now  the  iron  bars  which,  uselessly  (or  in  great  degree  worse 
than  uselessly),  enclosed  this  bit  of  ground,  and  made  it  pesti- 
lent, represented  a  quantity  of  work  which  would  have  cleansed 
the  Ccrshalton  pools  three  times  over ; — of  work,  partly 
cramped  and  deadly,  in  the  mine  ;  partly  fierce  *  and  exhaus- 
tive, at  the  furnace  ;  partly  foolish  and  sedentary,  of  ill- taught 
students  making  bad  designs :  wTork  from  the  beginning  to 
the  last  fruits  of  it,  and  in  all  the  branches  of  it,  venomous, 
deathful,  and  miserable.  Nov/,  how  did  it  come  to  pass  that 
this  work  was  done  instead  of  the  other ;  that  the  strength 
and  life  of  the  English  operative  were  spent  in  defiling  ground, 
instead  of  redeeming  it ;  and  in  producing  an  entirely  (in  that 
place)  valueless  piece  of  metal,  which  can  neither  be  eaten  nor 
breathed,  instead  of  medicinal  fresh  air,  and  pure  water? 

There  is  but  one  reason  for  it,  and  at  present  a  conclusive 
one, — that  the  capitalist  can  charge  per-centage  on  the  work 

*  *  A  fearful  occurrence  took  place  a  few  days  since,  Dear  W olverh amp- 
ton.  Thomas  Snape,  aged  nineteen,  was  on  duty  as  the  "  keeper''  of  a 
blast  furnace  at  Deepfield,  assisted  by  John  Gardner,  aged  eighteen,  and 
Joseph  Swift,  aged  thirty-seven.  The  furnace  contained  four  tons  of 
molten  iron,  and  an  equal  amount  of  cinders,  and  ought  to  have  been 
run  out  at  7.30  p.m.  But  Snape  and  his  mates,  engaged  in  talking  and 
drinking,  neglected  their  duty,  and,  in  the  meantime,  the  iron  rose  in 
the  furnace  until  it  reached  a  pipe  wherein  water  was  contained.  Just 
as  the  men  had  stripped,  and  were  proceeding  to  tap  the  furnace,  the 
water  in  the  pipe,  converted  into  steam,  burst  down  its  front  and  let 
loose  on  them  the  molten  metal,  which  instantaneously  consumed  Gard<? 
ner ;  Snape,  terribly  burnt,  and  mad  with  pain,  leaped  into  the  canal 
and  then  ran  home  and  fell  dead  on  the  threshold,  Swift  survived  to 
reach  the  hospital,  where  he  died  too. 

In  further  illustration  of  this  matter,  I  beg  the  reader  to  look  at  the 
article  on  the  '  Decay  of  the  English  Race,'  in  the  '  Pall-Mall  Gazette  *  of 
April  17,  of  this  year  ;  and  at  the  articles  on  the  *  Report  of  the  Thames 
Commission,'  in  any  journals  of  the  same  date. 


8 


PREFACE. 


in  the  one  case,  and  cannot  in  the  other.  If,  having  certain 
funds  for  supporting  labour  at  my  disposal,  I  pay  men  merely 
to  keep  my  ground  in  order,  my  money  is,  in  that  function, 
spent  once  for  all ;  but  if  I  pay  them  to  dig  iron  out  of  my 
ground,  and  work  it,  and  sell  it,  I  can  charge  rent  for  the 
ground,  and  per-centage  both  on  the  manufacture  and  the 
sale,  and  make  my  capital  profitable  in  these  three  bye- ways. 
The  greater  part  of  the  profitable  investment  of  capital,  in  the 
present  day,  is  in  operations  of  this  kind,  in  which  the  public 
is  persuaded  to  buy  something  of  no  use  to  it,  on  production, 
or  sale,  of  which,  the  capitalist  may  charge  per-centage  ;  the 
said  public  remaining  all  the  while  under  the  persuasion  that 
the  per-centages  thus  obtained  are  real  national  gains,  where- 
as, they  are  merely  filchings  out  of  partially  light  pockets,  to 
swell  heavy  ones. 

Thus,  the  Croydon  publican  buys  the  iron  railing,  to  make 
himself  more  conspicuous  to  drunkards.  The  public-house- 
keeper on  the  other  side  of  the  way  presently  buys  another 
railing,  to  out-rail  him  with.  Both  are,  as  to  their  relative  at- 
tractiveness to  customers  of  taste,  just  where  they  were  before ; 
but  they  have  lost  the  price  of  the  railings  ;  which  they  must 
either  themselves  finally  lose,  or  make  their  aforesaid  customers 
of  taste  pay,  by  raising  the  price  of  their  beer,  or  adulterating 
it.  Either  the  publicans,  or  their  customers,  are  thus  poorer 
by  precisely  what  the  capitalist  has  gained  ;  and  the  value  of 
the  work  itself,  meantime,  has  been  lost  to  the  nation ;  the 
iron  bars  in  that  form  and  place  being  wholly  useless.  It  is 
this  mode  of  taxation  of  the  poor  by  the  rich  which  is  referred 
to  in  the  text  (page  31),  in  comparing  the  modern  acquisitive 
power  of  capital  with  that  of  the  lance  and  sword  ;  the  only 
difference  .being  that  the  levy  of  black  mail  in  old  times  was 
by  force,  and  is  now  by  cozening.  The  old  rider  and  reiver 
frankly  quartered  himself  on  the  publican  for  the  night ;  the 
modern  one  merely  makes  his  lance  into  an  iron  spike,  and 
persuades  his  host  to  buy  it.  One  comes  as  an  open  robber, 
the  other  as  a  cheating  pedlar  ;  but  the  result,  to  the  injured 
person's  pocket,  is  absolutely  the  same.  Of  course  many  use- 
ful industries  mingle  with,  and  disguise  the  useless  ones ;  and 


PREFACE. 


9 


in  the  habits  of  energy  aroused  by  the  struggle,  there  is  a 
certain  direct  good.  It  is  far  better  to  spend  four  thousand 
pounds  in  making  a  good  gun,  and  then  to  blow  it  to  pieces, 
than  to  pass  life  in  idleness.  Only  do  not  let  it  be  called 
'  political  economy/  There  is  also  a  confused  notion  in  the 
minds  of  many  persons,  that  the  gathering  of  the  property  of 
the  poor  into  the  hands  of  the  rich  does  no  ultimate  harm  ; 
since,  in  whosesoever  hands  it  may  be,  it  must  be  spent  at  last, 
and  thus,  they  think,  return  to  the  poor  again.  This  fallacy 
has  been  again  and  again  exposed  ;  but  grant  the  plea  true, 
and  the  same  apology  may,  of  course,  be  made  for  black  mail, 
or  any  other  form  of  robbery.  It  might  be  (though  practically 
it  never  is)  as  advantageous  for  the  nation  that  the  robber 
should  have  the  spending  of  the  money  he  extorts,  as  that  the 
person  robbed  should  have  spent  it.  But  this  is  no  excuse 
for  the  theft.  If  I  were  to  put  a  turnpike  on  the  road  where 
it  passes  my  own  gate,  and  endeavour  to  exact  a  shilling  from 
every  passenger,  the  public  would  soon  do  away  with  my  gate, 
without  listening  to  any  plea  on  my  part  that  *  it  was  as  ad- 
vantageous to  them,  in  the  end,  that  I  should  spend  their 
shillings,  as  that  they  themselves  should.'  But  if,  instead  of 
out-facing  them  with  a  turnpike,  I  can  only  persuade  them  to 
come  in  and  buy  stones,  or  old  iron,  or  any  other  useless 
thing,  out  of  my  ground,  I  may  rob  them  to  the  same  extent, 
and  be,  moreover,  thanked  as  a  public  benefactor,  and  pro- 
moter of  commercial  prosperity.  And  this  main  question  for 
the  poor  of  England — for  the  poor  of  all  countries — is  wholly 
omitted  in  every  common  treatise  on  the  subject  of  wealth 
Even  by  the  labourers  themselves,  the  operation  of  capital  is 
regarded  only  in  its  effect  on  their  immediate  interests  ;  never 
in  the  far  more  terrific  power  of  its  appointment  of  the  kind 
and  the  object  of  labour.  It  matters  little,  ultimately,  how 
much  a  labourer  is  paid  for  making  anything  ;  but  it  matters 
fearfully  what  the  thing  is,  which  he  is  compelled  to  make.  If 
his  labour  is  so  ordered  as  to  produce  food,  and  fresh  air,  and 
fresh  water,  no  matter  that  his  wages  are  low  ; — the  food  and 
fresh  air  and  water  will  be  at  last  there  ;  and  he  will  at  last 
get  them.    But  if  he  is  paid  to  destroy  food  and  fresh  air,  ot 


10 


PREFACE. 


to  produce  iron  bars  instead  of  them, — the  food  and  air  will 
finally  not  be  there,  and  he  will  not  get  them,  to  his  great  and 
final  inconvenience.  So  that,  conclusively,  in  political  as  in 
household  economy,  the  great  question  is,  not  so  much  what 
money  you  have  in  your  pocket,  as  what  you  will  buy  with  it, 
and  do  with  it. 

I  have  been  long  accustomed,  as  all  men  engaged  in  work 
of  investigation  must  be,  to  hear  my  statements  laughed  at 
for  years,  before  they  are  examined  or  believed  ;  and  I  am 
generally  content  to  wait  the  public's  time.  But  it  has  not 
been  without  displeased  surprise  that  I  have  found  myself 
totally  unable,  as  yet,  by  any  repetition,  or  illustration,  to 
force  this  plain  thought  into  my  readers'  heads, — that  the 
wealth  of  nations,  as  of  men,  consists  in  substance,  not  in 
ciphers  ;  and  that  the  real  good  of  all  work,  and  of  all  com- 
merce, depends  on  the  final  worth  of  the  thing  you  make,  or 
get  by  it.  This  is  a  practical  enough  statement,  one  wrould 
think  :  but  the  English  public  has  been  so  possessed  by  its 
modern  school  of  economists  with  the  notion  that  Business  is 
always  good,  whether  it  be  busy  in  mischief  or  in  benefit  ; 
and  that  buying  and  selling  are  always  salutary,  whatever 
the  intrinsic  worth  of  what  you  buy  or  sell, — that  it  seems 
impossible  to  gain  so  much  as  a  patient  hearing  for  any  in- 
quiry respecting  the  substantial  result  of  our  eager  modern 
labours.  I  have  never  felt  more  checked  by  the  sense  of  this 
impossibility  than  in  arranging  the  heads  of  the  following 
three  lectures,  which,  though  delivered  at  considerable  inter- 
vals of  time,  and  in  different  places,  were  not  prepared  with- 
out reference  to  each  other.  Their  connection  wrould,  how- 
ever, have  been  made  far  more  distinct,  if  I  had  not  been 
prevented,  by  what  I  feel  to  be  another  great  difficulty  in 
addressing  English  audiences,  from  enforcing,  with  any  de- 
cision, the  common,  and  to  me  the  most  important,  part  of 
their  subjects.  I  chiefly  desired  (as  I  have  just  said)  to 
question  my  hearers — operatives,  merchants,  and  soldiers,  as 
to  the  ultimate  meaning  of  the  business  they  had  in  hand  *, 
and  to  know  from  them  what  they  expected  or  intended  their 
manufacture  to  come  to,  their  selling  to  come  to,  and  their 


PREFACE. 


ii 


killing  to  come  to.  That  appeared  the  first  point  needing 
determination  before  I  could  speak  to  them  with  any  real 
utility  or  effect.  'You  craftsmen — salesmen — swordsmen, — ■ 
do  but  tell  me  clearly  what  you  want,  then,  if  I  can  say  any- 
thing to  help  you,  I  will  ;  and  if  not,  I  will  account  to  you  as 
I  best  may  for  my  inability.'  But  in  order  to  put  this  ques- 
tion into  any  terms,  one  had  first  of  all  to  face  the  difficulty 
just  spoken  of — to  me  for  the  present  insuperable, — the  diffi- 
culty of  knowing  whether  to  address  one's  audience  as  believ- 
ing, or  not  believing,  in  any  other  world  than  this.  For  if  you 
address  any  average  modern  English  company  as  believing  in 
an  Eternal  life,  and  endeavour  to  draw  any  conclusions,  from 
this  assumed  belief,  as  to  their  present  business,  they  will 
forthwith  tell  you  that  what  you  say  is  very  beautiful,  but  it 
is  not  practical.  If,  on  the  contrary,  you  frankly  address 
them  as  unbelievers  in  Eternal  life,  and  try  to  draw  any  con- 
sequences from  that  unbelief, — they  immediately  hold  you 
for  an  accursed  person,  and  shake  off  the  dust  from  their  feet 
at  you.  And  the  more  I  thought  over  what  I  had  got  to  say, 
the  less  I  found  I  could  say  it,  without  some  reference  to  this 
intangible  or  intractable  part  of  the  subject.  It  made  all  the 
difference,  in  asserting  any  principle  of  war,  whether  one 
assumed  that  a  discharge  of  artillery  would  merely  knead 
down  a  certain  quantity  of  red  clay  into  a  level  line,  as  in  a 
brick  field  ;  or  whether,  out  of  every  separately  Christian- 
named  portion  of  the  ruinous  heap,  there  went  out,  into  the 
smoke  and  dead-fallen  air  of  battle,  some  astonished  condi- 
tion of  soul,  unwillingly  released.  It  made  all  the  difference, 
in  speaking  of  the  possible  range  of  commerce,  whether  one 
assumed  that  all  bargains  related  only  to  visible  property — or 
whether  property,  for  the  present  invisible,  but  nevertheless 
real,  was  elsewhere  purchasable  on  other  terms.  It  made  all 
the  difference,  in  addressing  a  body  of  men  subject  to  consid- 
erable hardship,  and  having  to  find  some  way  out  of  it — 
whether  one  could  confidentially  say  to  them,  c  My  friends, — 
you  have  only  to  die,  and  all  will  be  right ; '  or  whether  one 
had  any  secret  misgiving  that  such  advice  was  more  blessed 
to  him  that  gave,  than  to  him  that  took  it.    And  therefore 


12 


PREFACE. 


the  deliberate  reader  will  find,  throughout  these  lectures,  a 
hesitation  in  driving  points  home,  and  a  pausing  short  of  con- 
clusions which  he  will  feel  I  would  fain  have  come  to  ;  hesita- 
tion which  arises  wholly  from  this  uncertainty  of  my  hearers' 
temper.  t  For  I  do  not  now  speak,  nor  have  I  ever  spoken, 
since  the  time  of  my  first  forward  youth,  in  any  proselyting 
temper,  as  desiring  to  persuade  any  one  of  what,  in  such 
.matters,  I  thought  myself ;  but,  whomsoever  I  venture  to  ad- 
dress, I  take  for  the  time  his  creed  as  I  find  it ;  and  endeav- 
our to  push  it  into  such  vital  fruit  as  it  seems  capable  of. 
Thus,  it  is  a  creed  with  a  great  part  of  the  existing  English 
people,  that  they  are  in  possession  of  a  book  which  tells  them, 
straight  from  the  lips  of  God  all  they  ought  to  do,  and  need 
to  know.  I  have  read  that  book,  with  as  much  care  as  most 
of  them,  for  some  forty  years ;  and  am  thankful  that,  on  those 
who  trust  it,  I  can  press  its  pleadings.  My  endeavour  has 
been  uniformly  to  make  them  trust  it  more  deeply  than  they 
do  ;  trust  it,  not  in  their  own  favourite  verses  only,  but  in  the 
sum  of  all  ;  trust  it  not  as  a  fetish  or  talisman,  which  they 
are  to  be  saved  by  daily  repetitions  of  ;  but  as  a  Captain's 
order,  to  be  heard  and  obeyed  at  their  peril.  I  was  always 
encouraged  by  supposing  my  hearers  to  hold  such  belief.  To 
these,  if  to  any,  I  once  had  hope  of  addressing,  with  accept- 
ance, words  which  insisted  on  the  guilt  of  pride,  and  the 
futility  of  avarice  ;  from  these,  if  from  any,  I  once  expected 
ratification  of  a  political  economy,  which  asserted  that  the  life 
was  more  than  the  meat,  and  the  body  than  raiment ;  and 
these,  it  once  seemed  to  me,  I  might  ask  without  accusation 
or  fanaticism,  not  merely  in  doctrine  of  the  lips,  but  in  the 
bestowal  of  their  heart's  treasure,  to  separate  themselves  from 
the  crowd  of  whom  it  is  written,  '  After  all  these  things  do 
the  Gentiles  seek.' 

It  cannot,  however,  be  assumed,  with  any  semblance  of 
reason,  that  a  general  audience  is  now  wholly,  or  even  in 
majority,  composed  of  these  religious  persons.  A  large  por- 
tion must  always  consist  of  men  who  admit  no  such  creed  ;  or 
who,  at  least,  are  inaccessible  to  appeals  founded  on  it.  And 
as,  with  the  so-called  Christian,  I  desired  to  plead  for  honest 


PREFACE. 


n 


declaration  and  fulfilment  of  his  belief  in  life, — with  the  so- 
called  Infidel,  I  desired  to  plead  for  an  honest  declaration  and 
fulfilment  of  his  belief  in  death.  The  dilemma  is  inevitable. 
Men  must  either  hereafter  live,  or  hereafter  die  ;  fate  may  be 
bravely  met,  and  conduct  wisely  ordered,  on  either  expecta- 
tion; but  never  in  hesitation  between  ungrasped  hope,  and 
unconfronted  fear.  We  usually  believe  in  immortality,  so  far 
as  to  avoid  preparation  for  death  ;  and  in  mortality,  so  far  as 
to  avoid  preparation  for  anything  after  death.  Whereas,  a 
wise  man  will  at  least  hold  himself  prepared  for  one  or  other 
of  two  events,  of  which  one  or  other  is  inevitable  ;  and  will 
have  all  things  in  order,  for  his  sleep,  or  in  readiness,  for  his 
awakening. 

Nor  have  we  any  right  to  call  it  an  ignoble  judgment,  if  he 
determine  to  put  them  in  order,  as  for  sleep.  A  brave  belief 
in  life  is  indeed  an  enviable  state  of  mind,  but,  as  far  as  I  can 
discern,  an  unusual  one.  I  know  few  Christians  so  convinced 
of  the  splendour  of  the  rooms  in  their  Father's  house,  as  to 
be  happier  when  their  friends  are  called  to  those  mansions, 
than  they  would  have  been  if  the  Queen  had  sent  for  them  to 
live  at  Court :  nor  has  the  Church's  most  ardent  '  desire  to 
depart,  and  be  with  Christ,'  ever  cured  it  of  the  singular  habit 
of  putting  on  mourning  for  every  person  summoned  to  such 
departure.  On  the  contrary,  a  brave  belief  in  death  has  been 
assuredly  held  by  many  not  ignoble  persons,  and  it  is  a  sign 
of  the  last  depravity  in  the  Church  itself,  when  it  assumes 
that  such  a  belief  is  inconsistent  with  either  purity  of  charac- 
ter, or  energy  of  hand.  The  shortness  of  life  is  not,  to  any 
rational  person,  a  conclusive  reason  for  wasting  the  space  of 
it  which  may  be  granted  him  ;  nor  does  the  anticipation  of 
death  to-morrow  suggest,  to  any  one  but  a  drunkard,  the  ex- 
pediency of  drunkenness  to-day.  To  teach  that  there  is  no 
device  in  the  grave,  may  indeed  make  the  deviceless  person 
more  contented  in  his  dulness ;  but  it  will  make  the  deviser 
only  more  earnest  in  devising,  nor  is  human  conduct  likely,  in 
every  case,  to  be  purer  under  the  conviction  that  all  its  evil 
may  in  a  moment  be  pardoned,  and  all  its  wrong-doing  in  n 
moment  redeemed  ;  and  that  the  sigh  of  repentance,  which 


14 


PREFACE. 


purges  the  guilt  of  the  past,  will  waft  the  soul  into  a  felicity 
which  forgets  its  pain, — than  it  may  be  under  the  sterner,  and 
to  many  not  unwise  minds,  more  probable,  apprehension,  that 
'  what  a  man  soweth  that  shall  he  also  reap ' — or  others  reap, — 
when  he,  the  living  seed  of  pestilence,  walketh  no  more  in 
darkness,  but  lies  down  therein. 

But  to  men  whose  feebleness  of  sight,  or  bitterness  of  soul, 
or  the  offence  given  by  the  conduct  of  those  who  claim  higher- 
hope,  may  have  rendered  this  painful  creed  the  only  possible 
one,  there  is  an  appeal  to  be  made,  more  secure  in  its  ground 
than  any  which  can  be  addressed  to  happier  persons.  I  would 
fain,  if  I  might  offencelessly,  have  spoken  to  them  as  if  none 
others  heard  ;  and  have  said  thus  :  Hear  me,  you  dying  men, 
who  will  soon  be  deaf  for  ever.  For  these  others,  at  your 
right  hand  and  your  left,  who  look  forward  to  a  state  of  in- 
finite existence,  in  which  all  their  errors  will  be  overruled, 
and  all  their  faults  forgiven  ;  for  these,  who,  stained  and 
blackened  in  the  battle  smoke  of  mortality,  have  but  to  dip 
themselves  for  an  instant  in  the  font  of  death,  and  to  rise  re- 
newed of  plumage,  as  a  dove  that  is  covered  with  silver,  and 
her  feathers  like  gold ;  for  these,  indeed,  it  may  be  permis- 
sible to  waste  their  numbered  moments,  through  faith  in  a 
future  of  innumerable  hours ;  to  these,  in  their  weakness,  it 
may  be  conceded  that  they  should  tamper  with  sin  which  can 
only  bring  forth  fruit  of  righteousness,  and  profit  by  the  in- 
iquity which,  one  day,  will  be  remembered  no  more.  In  them, 
it  may  be  no  sign  of  hardness  of  heart  to  neglect  the  poor, 
over  whom  they  know  their  Master  is  watching  ;  and  to  leave 
those  to  perish  temporarily,  who  cannot  perish  eternally. 
But,  for  you,  there  is  no  such  hope,  and  therefore  no  such 
excuse.  This  fate,  which  you  ordain  for  the  wretched,  you 
believe  to  be  all  their  inheritance  ;  you  may  crush  them,  be- 
fore the  moth,  and  they  will  never  rise  to  rebuke  you  ; — their 
breath,  which  fails  for  lack  of  food,  once  expiring,  will  never 
be  recalled  to  whisper  against  you  a  word  of  accusing ; — they 
and  you,  as  you  think,  shall  lie  down  together  in  the  dust, 
and  the  worms  cover  you  ; — and  for  them  there  shall  be  no 
consolation,  and  on  you  no  vengeance, — only  the  question 


PREFACE. 


15 


murmured  above  your  grave  :  '  Who  shall  repay  him  what  he 
hath  done  ? '  Is  it  therefore  easier  for  you  in  your  heart  to 
inflict  the  sorrow  for  which  there  is  no  remedy  ?  Will  you 
take,  wantonly,  this  little  all  of  his  life  from  your  poor  broth- 
er, and  make  his  brief  hours  long  to  him  with  pain  ?  Will 
you  be  readier  to  the  injustice  which  can  never  be  redressed ; 
and  niggardly  of  mercy  which  you  can  bestow  but  once,  and 
which,  refusing,  you  refuse  for  ever  ?  I  think  better  of  you, 
even  of  the  most  selfish,  than  that  you  would  do  this,  well 
understood.  And  for  yourselves,  it  seems  to  me,  the  question 
becomes  not  less  grave,  in  these  curt  limits.  Jf  your  life  were 
but  a  fever  fit, — the  madness  of  a  night,  whose  follies  were 
ail  to  be  forgotten  in  the  dawn,  it  might  matter  little  how  you 
fretted  away  the  sickly  hours, — what  toys  you  snatched  at,  or 
let  fall — what  visions  you  followed  wistfully  with  the  de- 
ceived eyes  of  sleepless  phrenzy.  Is  the  earth  only  an  hos- 
pital ?  Play,  if  you  care  to  play,  on  the  floor  of  the  hospital 
dens.  Knit  its  straw  into  what  crowns  please  you ;  gather 
the  dust  of  it  for  treasure,  and  die  rich  in  that,  clutching  at 
the  black  motes  in  the  air  with  your  dying  hands  ; — and  yet, 
it  may  be  well  with  you.  But  if  this  life  be  no  dream,  and 
the  world  no  hospital ;  if  all  the  peace  and  power  and  joy 
you  can  ever  win,  must  be  won  now  ;  and  all  fruit  of  victory 
gathered  here,  or  never  ; — will  you  still,  throughout  the  puny 
totality  of  your  life,  weary  yourselves  in  the  fire  for  vanity  ? 
If  there  is  no  rest  which  remaineth  for  you,  is  there  none  you 
might  presently  take  ?  was  this  grass  of  the  earth  made  green 
for  your  shroud  only,  not  for  your  bed  ?  and  can  you  never 
lie  down  upon  it,  but  only  under  it?  The  heathen,  to  whose 
creed  you  have  returned,  thought  not  so.  They  knew  that 
life  brought  its  contest,  but  they  expected  from  it  also  the 
crown  of  all  contest :  No  proud  one  !  no  jewelled  circlet  flam- 
ing through  Heaven  above  the  height  of  the  unmerited  throne  ; 
only  some  few  leaves  of  wild  olive,  cool  to  the  tired  brow, 
through  a  few  years  of  peace.  It  should  have  been  of  gold, 
they  thought ;  but  Jupiter  was  poor  ;  this  was  the  best  the 
god  could  give  them,  Seeking  a  greater  than  this,  they  had 
known  it  a  mockery.    Not  in  war,  not  in  wealth,  not  in  tyr- 


16 


PREFACE. 


anny,  was  there  any  happiness  to  be  found  for  them— only 
in  kindly  peace,  fruitful  and  free.  The  wreath  was  to  be  of 
wild  olive,  mark  you  : — the  tree  that  grows  carelessly,  tufting 
the  rocks  with  no  vivid  bloom,  no  verdure  of  branch  ;  only 
with  soft  snow  of  blossom,  and  scarcely  fulfilled  fruit,  mixed 
with  grey  leaf  and  thornset  stem  ;  no  fastening  of  diadem 
for  you  but  with  such  sharp  embroidery !  But  this,  such  as 
it  is,  you  may  win  while  yet  you  live  ;  type  of  grey  honour 
and  sweet  rest.*  Free-heartedness,  and  graciousness,  and 
undisturbed  trust,  and  requited  love,  and  the  sight  of  the 
peace  of  others,  and  the  ministry  to  their  pain ;— these,  and 
the  blue  sky  above  you,  and  the  sweet  waters  and  flowers  of 
the  earth  beneath ;  and  mysteries  and  presences,  innumer- 
able, of  living  things, — these  may  yet  be  here  your  riches  ; 
untormenting  and  divine  :  serviceable  for  the  life  that  now  is 
nor,  it  may  be,  without  promise  of  that  which  is  to  come. 


THE  CROWN  OF  WILD  OLIVE. 


LECTURE  L 
WORK. 

{Delivered  before  the  Working  Men's  Institute^  at  Camberwell.) 

My  Friends, — I  have  not  come  among  you  to-night  to  en* 
deavour  to  give  you  an  entertaining  lecture  ;  but  to  tell  you 
a  few  plain  facts,  and  ask  you  some  plain,  but  necessary 
questions.  I  have  seen  and  known  too  much  of  the  struggle 
for  life  among  our  labouring  population,  to  feel  at  ease,  even 
under  any  circumstances,  in  inviting  them  to  dwell  on  the 
trivialities  of  my  own  studies  ;  but,  much  more,  as  I  meet  to- 
night, for  the  first  time,  the  members  of  a  working  Institute 
established  in  the  district  in  which  I  have  passed  the  greater 
part  of  my  life,  I  am  desirous  that  we  should  at  once  under- 
stand each  other,  on  graver  matters.  I  would  fain  tell  you, 
with  what  feelings,  and  with  what  hope,  I  regard  this  Insti- 
tution, as  one  of  many  such,  now  happily  established  through- 
out England,  as  well  as  in  other  countries  ; — Institutions 
which  are  preparing  the  way  for  a  great  change  in  all  the 
circumstances  of  industrial  life  ;  but  of  which  the  success 
must  wholly  depend  upon  our  clearly  understanding  the  cir- 
cumstances and  necessary  limits  of  this  change.  No  teacher 
can  truly  promote  the  cause  of  education,  until  he  knows  the 
conditions  of  the  life  for  which  that  education  is  to  prepare 
his  pupil.  And  the  fact  that  he  is  called  upon  to  address 
you  nominally,  as  a  'Working  Class,'  must  compel  him,  if  he 
is  in  any  wise  earnest  or  thoughtful,  to  inquire  in  the  outset. 


18 


THE  CROWN  OF  WILD  OLIVE. 


on  what  you  yourselves  suppose  this  class  distinction  has 
been  founded  in  the  past,  and  must  be  founded  in  the  future. 
The  manner  of  the  amusement,  and  the  matter  of  the  teach- 
ing, which  any  of  us  can  offer  you,  must  depend  wholly  on 
our  first  understanding  from  you,  whether  you  think  the  dis- 
tinction heretofore  drawn  between  working  men  and  others, 
is  tzruly  or  falsely  founded.  Do  you  accept  it  as  it  stands  ? 
do  you  wish  ifc  to  be  modified  ?  or  do  you  think  the  object  of 
education  is  to  efface  it,  and  make  us  forget  it  for  ever  ? 

Let  me  make  myself  more  distinctly  understood.  We  call 
this — you  and  I — a  '  W orking  Men's '  Institute,  and  our  col- 
lege in  London,  a  '  Working  Men's '  College.  Now,  how  do 
you  consider  that  these  several  institutes  differ,  or  ought  to 
differ,  from  '  idle  men's  •  institutes  and  '  idle  men's 9  colleges  ? 
Or  by  what  other  wrord  than  '  idle '  shall  I  distinguish  those 
whom  the  happiest  and  wisest  of  working  men  do  not  object 
to  call  the  '  Upper  Classes  ?  '  Are  there  really  upper  classes, 
— are  there  lower?  How  much  should  they  always  be  ele- 
vated, how  much  always  depressed?  And,  gentlemen  and 
ladies — I  pray  those  of  you  who  are  here  to  forgive  me  the 
offence  there  may  be  in  wThat  I  am  going  to  say.  It  is  not  1 
wTho  wish  to  say  it.  Bitter  voices  say  it ;  voices  of  battle  and 
of  famine  through  all  the  world,  which  must  be  heard  some 
day,  wThoever  keeps  silence.  Neither  is  it  to  you  specially 
that  I  say  it.  I  am  sure  that  most  now  present  know  their 
duties  of  kindness,  and  fulfil  them,  better  perhaps  than  I  do 
mine.  But  I  speak  to  you  as  representing  your  whole  class, 
which  errs,  I  know,  chiefly  by  thoughtlessness,  but  not  there- 
fore the  less  terribly.  Wilful  error  is  limited  by  the  will,  but 
what  limit  is  there  to  that  of  which  we  are  unconscious  ? 

Bear  with  me,  therefore,  while  I  turn  to  these  workmen, 
and  ask  them,  also  as  representing  a  great  multitude,  what 
they  think  the  '  upper  classes  •  are,  and  ought  to  be,  in  rela- 
tion to  them.  Answer,  you  workmen  who  are  here,  as  you 
would  among  yourselves,  frankly  ;  and  tell  me  how  you  would 
have  me  call  those  classes.  Am  I  to  call  them — would  you 
think  me  right  in  calling  them — the  idle  classes  ?  I  think  you 
would  feel  somewhat  uneasy,  and  as  if  I  were  not  treating 


WORK 


19 


my  subject  honestly,  or  speaking  from  my  heart,  if  I  went  on 
under  the  supposition  that  all  rich  people  were  idle.  You 
would  be  both  unjust  and  unwise  if  you  allowed  me  to  say 
that  ; — not  less  unjust  than  the  rich  people  who  say  that  all 
the  poor  are  idle,  and  will  never  work  if  they  can  help  it,  or 
more  than  they  can  help. 

For  indeed  the  fact  is,  that  there  are  idle  poor  and  idle 
rich  ;  and  there  are  busy  poor  and  busy  rich.  Many  a  beggar 
is  as  lazy  as  if  he  had  ten  thousand  a  year ;  and  many  a  man 
of  large  fortune  is  busier  than  his  errand-boy,  and  never 
would  think  of  stopping  in  the  street  to  play  marbles.  So 
that,  in  a  large  view,  the  distinction  between  workers  and 
idlers,  as  between  knaves  and  honest  men,  runs  through  the 
very  heart  and  innermost  economies  of  men  of  all  ranks  and 
in  all  positions.  There  is  a  working  class — strong  and  happy 
— among  both  rich  and  poor  ;  there  is  an  idle  class — weak, 
wicked,  and  miserable — among  both  rich  and  poor.  And  the 
worst  of  the  misunderstandings  arising  between  the  two  orders 
come  of  the  unlucky  fact  that  the  wise  of  one  class  habitually 
contemplate  the  foolish  of  the  other.  If  the  busy  rich  people 
watched  and  rebuked  the  idle  rich  people,  all  wrould  be  right  ; 
and  if  the  busy  poor  people  watched  and  rebuked  the  idle 
poor  people,  all  would  be  right.  But  each  class  has  a  tendency 
to  look  for  the  faults  of  the  other.  A  hard-working  man  of 
property  is  particularly  offended  by  an  idle  beggar  ;  and  an 
orderly,  but  poor,  workman  is  naturally  intolerant  of  the  licen- 
tious luxury  of  the  rich.  And  what  is  severe  judgment  in  the 
minds  of  the  just  men  of  either  class,  becomes  fierce  enmity 
in  the  unjust — but  among  the  unjust  only.  None  but  the  dis- 
solute among  the  poor  look  upon  the  rich  as  their  natural 
enemies,  or  desire  to  pillage  their  houses  and  divide  their 
property.  None  but  the  dissolute  among  the  rich  speak  in 
opprobrious  terms  of  the  vices  and  follies  of  the  poor. 

There  is,  then,  no  class  distinction  between  idle  and  indus- 
trious people  ;  and  I  am  going  to-night  to  speak  only  of  the 
industrious.  The  idle  people  we  will  put  out  of  our  thoughts 
at  once — they  are  mere  nuisances — what  ought  to  be  done  with 
them,  we'll  talk  of  at  another  time.    But  there  are  class  dis* 


20 


THE  CROWN  OF  WILD  OLIVE. 


tinctions,  among  the  industrious  themselves ;  tremendous  dis- 
tinctions, which  rise  and  fall  to  every  degree  in  the  infinite 
thermometer  of  human  pain  and  of  human  power — distinc- 
tions of  high  and  low,  of  lost  and  won,  to  the  whole  reach  of 
man's  soul  and  body. 

These  separations  we  will  study,  and  the  laws  of  them, 
dmong  energetic  men  only,  who,  whether  they  work  or  whether 
they  play,  put  their  strength  into  the  work,  and  their  strength 
into  the  game  ;  being  in  the  full  sense  of  the  word  '  industri- 
ous,' one  way  or  another — with  a  purpose,  or  without.  And 
these  distinctions  are  mainly  four  : 

I.  Between  those  who  work,  and  those  who  play. 

II.  Between  those  who  produce  the  means  of  life,  and  those 
who  consume  them. 

HI.  Between  those  who  work  with  the  head,  and  those  who 
work  with  the  hand. 

IV.  Between  those  who  work  wisely,  and  who  work  fool- 
ishly. 

For  easier  memory,  let  us  say  we  are  going  to  oppose,  in 
our  examination. — 

I.  Work  to  play  ; 
II.  Production  to  consumption ; 
HI.  Head  to  Hand  ;  and, 
IV.  Sense  to  nonsense. 

I.  First,  then,  of  the  distinction  between  the  classes  who 
work  and  the  classes  who  play.  Of  course  we  must  agree 
upon  a  definition  of  these  terms, — work  and  play, — before 
going  farther.  Now,  roughly,  not  with  vain  subtlety  of  defi- 
nition, but  for  plain  use  of  the  words,  '  play  9  is  an  exertion  of 
body  or  mind,  made  to  please  ourselves,  and  with  no  deter- 
mined end  ;  and  work  is  a  thing  done  because  it  ought  to  be 
done,  and  with  a  determined  end.  You  play,  as  you  call  it, 
at  cricket,  for  instance.  That  is  as  hard  work  as  anything 
else  ;  but  it  amuses  you,  and  it  has  no  result  but  the  amuse- 
ment If  it  were  done  as  an  ordered  form  of  exercise,  for 
health's  sake,  it  would  become  work  directly.  So,  in  like 
manner,  whatever  we  do  to  please  ourselves,  and  only  for  the 
sake  of  the  pleasure,  not  for  an  ultimate  object,  is  'play,'  the 


WORK. 


21 


^pleasing  thing/  not  the  useful  thing.    Play  may  be  useful  in 

a  secondary  sense  (nothing  is  indeed  more  useful  or  necessary) ; 
but  the  use  of  it  depends  on  its  being  spontaneous. 

Let  us.  then,  enquire  together  what  sort  of  games  the  play- 
ing class  in  England  spend  their  lives  in  playing  at. 

The  first  of  all  English  games  is  making  money.  That  is 
an  all-absorbing  game ;  and  we  knock  each  other  dowTn  often- 
er  in  playing  at  that  than  at  foot-ball,  or  any  other  roughest 
sport  ;  and  it  is  absolutely  without  purpose  ;  no  one  who  en- 
gages heartily  in  that  game  ever  knows  why.  Ask  a  great 
money-maker  what  he  wants  to  do  with  his  money — he  never 
knows.  He  doesn't  make  it  to  do  anything  with  it.  He  gets 
it  only  that  he  may  get  it.  '  What  will  you  make  of  w7hat  you 
have  got?  ■  you  ask.  "  Well,  I'll  get  more,'  he  says.  Just  as, 
at  cricket,  you  get  more  runs.  There's  no  use  in  the  runs,  but 
to  get  more  of  them  than  other  people  is  the  game.  And 
there's  no  use  in  the  money,  but  to  have  more  of  it  than  other 
people  is  the  game.  So  all  that  great  foul  city  of  London 
there, — rattling,  growling,  smoking,  stinking, —  a  ghastly  heap 
of  fermenting  brickwork,  pouring  out  poison  at  every  pore,— 
you  fancy  it  is  a  city  of  work  ?  Not  a  street  of  it !  It  is  a 
great  city  of  play ;  very  nasty  play,  and  very  hard  play,  but 
still  play.  It  is  only  Lord's  cricket  ground  without  the  turf, — 
a  huge  billiard  table  without  the  cloth,  and  with  pockets  as  deep 
as  the  bottomless  pit ;  but  mainly  a  billiard  table,  after  all. 

Well,  the  first  great  English  game  is  this  playing  at  coun- 
ters. It  differs  from  the  rest  in  that  it  appears  always  to  be 
producing  money,  while  every  other  game  is  expensive.  But 
it  does  not  always  produce  money.  There's  a  great  difference 
between  '  winning '  money  and  '  making  '  it ;  a  great  difference 
between  getting  it  out  of  another  man's  pocket  into  ours,  or 
filling  both.  Collecting  money  is  by  no  means  the  same  thing 
as  making  it ;  the  tax-gatherer's  house  is  not  the  Mint ;  and 
much  of  the  apparent  gain  (so  called),  in  commerce,  is  only  a 
form  of  taxation  on  carriage  or  exchange. 

Our  next  great  English  game,  however,  hunting  and  shoot- 
ing, is  costly  altogether  ;  and  how  much  we  are  fined  for  it 
annually  in  land,  horses,  gamekeepers,  and  game  laws,  and  all 


22 


THE  CROWN  OF  WILD  OLIVE. 


else  that  accompanies  that  beautiful  and  special  English  game, 
I  will  not  endeavour  to  count  now  :  but  note  only  that,  except 
for  exercise,  this  is  not  merely  a  useless  game,  but  a  deadly 
one,  to  all  connected  with  it.  For  through  horse-racing,  you 
get  every  form  of  what  the  higher  classes  everywhere  call 
'Play,'  in  distinction  from  all  other  plays  ;  that  is — gambling; 
by  no  means  a  beneficial  or  recreative  game  :  and,  through 
game-preserving,  you  get  also  some  curious  laying  out  of 
ground  ;  that  beautiful  arrangement  of  dwelling-house  for 
man  and  beast,  by  which  we  have  grouse  and  black-cock — so 
many  brace  to  the  acre,  and  men  and  women — so  many  brace 
to  the  garret.  I  often  wonder  what  the  angelic  builders  and 
surveyors— the  angelic  builders  who  build  the  c  many  man- 
sions '  up  above  there  ;  and  the  angelic  surveyors,  who  meas- 
ured that  four-square  city  with  their  measuring  reeds — I  won- 
der what  they  think,  or  are  supposed  to  think,  of  the  laying 
out  of  ground  by  this  nation,  which  has  set  itself,  as  it  seems, 
literally  to  accomplish,  word  for  word,  or  rather  fact  for  word, 
in  the  persons  of  those  poor  whom  its  Master  left  to  represent 
him,  what  that  Master  said  of  himself — that  foxes  and  birds 
had  homes,  but  He  none. 

Then,  next  to  the  gentlemen's  game  of  hunting,  we  must 
put  the  ladies'  game  of  dressing.  It  is  not  the  cheapest  of 
games.  I  saw  a  brooch  at  a  jeweller's  in  Bond  Street  a  fort- 
night ago,  not  an  inch  wide,  and  without  any  singular  jewel 
in  it,  yet  worth  3,000Z.  And  I  wish  I  could  tell  you  what  this 
'play'  costs,  altogether,  in  England,  France,  and  Russia  an- 
nually. But  it  is  a  pretty  game,  and  on  certain  terms,  1  likp 
it ;  nay,  I  don't  see  it  played  quite  as  much  as  I  would  fail 
have  it.  You  ladies  like  to  lead  the  fashion  : — by  all  mean3 
lead  it — lead  it  thoroughly,  lead  it  far  enough.  Dress  your- 
selves nicely,  and  dress  every  body  else  nicely.  Lead  the  fash- 
ions for  the  poor  first ;  make  them  look  well,  and  you  yourselves 
will  look,  in  ways  of  which  you  have  now  no  conception,  all 
the  better.  The  fashions  you  have  set  for  some  time  among 
your  peasantry  are  not  pretty  ones  ;  their  doublets  are  too 
irregularly  slashed,  and  the  wind  blows  too  frankly  through 
them. 


WORK. 


23 


Then  there  are  other  games,  wild  enough,  as  I  could  show 
you  if  I  had  time. 

There's  playing  at  literature,  and  playing  at  art — very  dif- 
ferent, both,  from  working  at  literature,  or  working  at  art, 
but  I've  no  time  to  speak  of  these.  I  pass  to  the  greatest  of 
all — the  play  of  plays,  the  great  gentlemen's  game,  which 
ladies  like  them  best  to  play  at, — the  game  of  War.  It  is  en- 
trancingly  pleasant  to  the  imagination  ;  the  facts  of  it,  not 
always  so  pleasant.  We  dress  for  it,  however,  more  finely 
than  for  any  other  sport ;  and  go  out  to  it,  not  merely  in  scar- 
let, as  to  hunt,  but  in  scarlet  and  gold,  and  all  manner  of  fine 
colours  :  of  course  we  could  fight  better  in  grey,  and  without 
feathers  ;  but  all  nations  have  agreed  that  it  is  good  to  be 
well  dressed  at  this  play.  Then  the  bats  and  balls  are  very 
costly  ;  our  English  and  French  bats,  with  the  balls  and 
wickets,  even  those  which  we  don't  make  any  use  of,  costing, 
I  suppose,  now  about  fifteen  millions  of  money  annually  to 
each  nation  ;  all  of  which,  you  know  is  paid  for  by  hard  la- 
bourer's work  in  the  furrow  and  furnace.  A  costly  game  ! — 
not  to  speak  of  its  consequences  ;  I  will  say  at  present  nothing 
of  these.  The  mere  immediate  cost  of  all  these  plays  is  what 
I  want  you  to  consider  ;  they  all  cost  deadly  work  somewhere, 
as  many  of  us  know  too  well.  The  jewel-cutter,  whose 
sight  fails  over  the  diamonds ;  the  weaver,  whose  arm  fails 
over  the  web  ;  the  iron -forger,  whose  breath  fails  before  the 
furnace — they  know  what  work  is — they,  who  have  all  the 
work,  and  none  of  the  play,  except  a  kind  they  have  named 
for  themselves  down  in  the  black  north  country,  where  c  play ' 
means  being  laid  up  by  sickness.  It  is  a  pretty  example  foi 
philologists,  of  varying  dialect,  this  change  in  the  sense  oi 
the  word  '  play,'  as  used  in  the  black  country  of  Birmingham, 
and  the  red  and  black  country  of  Baden  Baden.  Yes.  gentle- 
men, and  gentlewomen,  of  England,  who  think  '  one  moment 
unamused  a  misery,  not  made  for  feeble  man/  this  is  what 
you  have  brought  the  word  'play'  to  mean,  in  the  heart  of 
merry  England  !  You  may  have  your  fluting  and  piping ; 
but  there  are  sad  children  sitting  in  the  market-place,  wIig 
indeed  cannot  say  to  you,  ( We  have  piped  unto  you,  and  ye 


24 


THE  CROWN  OF  WILD  OLIVE. 


have  not  danced  : '  but  eternally  shall  say  to  you,  '  We  have 
mourned  unto  you,  and  ye  have  not  lamented/ 

This,  then,  is  the  first  distinction  between  the  c  upper  and 
lower'  classes.  And  this  is  one  which  is  by  no  means  neces- 
sary ;  which  indeed  must,  in  process  of  good  time,  be  by  all 
honest  men's  consent  abolished.  Men  will  be  taught  that  an 
existence  of  play,  sustained  by  the  blood  of  other  creatures, 
is  a  good  existence  for  gnats  and  sucking  fish  ;  but  not  for 
men  :  that  neither  days,  nor  lives,  can  be  made  holy  by  doing 
nothing  in  them  :  that  the  best  prayer  at  the  beginning  of  a 
day  is  that  we  may  not  lose  its  moments  ;  and  the  best  grace 
before  meat,  the  consciousness  that  we  have  justly  earned  our 
dinner.  And  when  we  have  this  much  of  plain  Christianity 
preached  to  us  again,  and  enough  respect  for  what  we  regard 
as  inspiration,  as  not  to  think  that  £  Son,  go  work  to-day  in  my 
vineyard,'  means  '  Fool,  go  play  to-day  in  my  vineyard,'  wTe 
shall  all  be  wTorkers,  in  one  way  or  another  ;  and  this  much  at 
least  of  the  distinction  between  '  upper 9  and  '  lower  '  forgotten. 

II.  I  pass  then  to  our  second  distinction  ;  between  the 
rich  and  poor,  between  Dives  and  Lazarus, — distinction 
which  exists  more  sternly,  I  suppose,  in  this  day,  than  ever 
in  the  world,  Pagan  or  Christian,  till  now.  I  will  put  it 
sharply  before  you,  to  begin  with,  merely  by  reading  two 
paragraphs  which  I  cut  from  two  papers  that  lay  on  my 
breakfast  table  on  the  same  morning,  the  25th  of  November, 
18G4.  The  piece  about  the  rich  Kussian  at  Paris  is  common- 
place enough,  and  stupid  besides  (for  fifteen  francs, — 
12s.  6d, — is  nothing  for  a  rich  man  to  give  for  a  couple  of 
peaches,  out  of  season).  Still,  the  two  paragraphs  printed 
on  the  same  day  are  worth  putting  side  by  side. 

£  Such  a  man  is  now  here.  He  is  a  Russian,  and,  with 
your  permission,  we  will  call  him  Count  Teufelskine.  In 
dress  he  is  sublime  ;  art  is  considered  in  that  toilet,  the  har- 
mony of  colour  respected,  the  chiar  oscuro  evident  in  well- 
selected  contrast.  In  manners  he  is  dignified — nay,  perhaps 
apathetic  :  nothing  disturbs  the  placid  serenity  of  that  calm 
exterior.  One  day  our  friend  breakfasted  chez  Bignon. 
When  the  bill  came  he  read,  "Two  peaches,  15f.*   He  paid 


WORK. 


25 


"Peaches  scarce,  I  presume ?"  was  his  sole  remark.  "No. 
sir,"  replied  the  waiter,  "but  Teufelskines  are."'  Telegraph, 
November  25,  1864. 

'  Yesterday  morning,  at  eight  o'olock,  a  woman,  passing  a 
dung  heap  in  the  stone  yard  near  the  recently-erected  alms- 
houses in  Shadwell  Gap,  High  Street,  Shadwell,  called  the  at- 
tention of  a  Thames  police-constable  to  a  man  in  a  sitting 
position  on  the  dung  heap,  and  said  she  was  afraid  he  was 
dead.  Her  fears  proved  to  be  true.  The  wretched  creature 
appeared  to  have  been  dead  several  hours.  He  had  perished 
of  cold  and  wet,  and  the  rain  had  been  beating  down  on  him 
all  night.  The  deceased  was  a  bone-picker.  He  was  in  the 
lowest  stage  of  poverty,  poorly  clad,  and  half-starved.  The 
police  had  frequently  driven  him  away  from  the  stone  yard, 
between  sunset  and  sunrise,  and  told  him  to  go  home.  He 
selected  a  most  desolate  spot  for  his  wretched  death.  A 
penny  and  some  bones  were  found  in  his  pockets.  The  de- 
ceased was  between  fifty  and  sixty  years  of  age.  Inspector 
Eoberts,  of  the  K  division,  has  given  directions  for  inquiries 
to  be  made  at  the  lodging-houses  respecting  the  deceased,  to 
ascertain  his  identity  if  possible.' — Morning  Post,  November 
25,  1864. 

You  have  the  separation  thus  in  brief  compass  ;  and  I  want 
you  to  take  notice  of  the  '  a  penny  and  some  bones  were  found 
in  his  pockets/  and  to  compare  it  with  this  third  statement, 
from  the  Telegraph  of  January  16th  of  this  year  : — 

'Again,  the  dietary  scale  for  adult  and  juvenile  paupers  was 
drawn  up  by  the  most  conspicuous  political  economists  in 
England.  It  is  low  in  quantity,  but  it  is  sufficient  to  support 
nature  ;  yet  within  ten  years  of  the  passing  of  the  Poor  Law 
Act,  we  heard  of  the  paupers  in  the  Andover  Union  gnawing 
the  scraps  of  putrid  flesh  and  sucking  the  marrow  from  the 
bones  of  horses  which  they  were  employed  to  crush.' 

You  see  my  reason  for  thinking  that  our  Lazarus  of  Chris- 
tianity has  some  advantage  over  the  Jewish  one.  Jewish 
Lazarus  expected,  or  at  least  prayed,  to  be  fed  with  crumbs 
from  the  rich  man's  table  ;  but  our  Lazarus  is  fed  with  crumbs 
from  the  dog's  table. 


26 


THE  CROWN  OF  WILD  OLIVE. 


Now  this  distinction  between  rich  and  poor  rests  on  two 
bases.  Within  its  proper  limits,  on  a  basis  which  is  lawful 
and  everlastingly  necessary  ;  beyond  them,  on  a  basis  unlaw- 
ful, and  everlastingly  corrupting  the  frame-work  of  society. 
The  lawful  basis  of  wealth  is,  that  a  man  who  works  should 
be  paid  the  fair  value  of  his  work ;  and  that  if  he  does  not 
choose  to  spend  it  to-day,  he  should  have  free  leave  to  keep 
it,  and  spend  it  to-morrow.  Thus,  an  industrious  man  work- 
ing daily,  and  laying  by  daily,  attains  at  last  the  possession 
of  an  accumulated  sum  of  wealth,  to  which  he  has  absolute 
right.  The  idle  person  who  will  not  work,  and  the  wasteful 
person  who  lays  nothing  by,  at  the  end  of  the  same  time  will 
be  doubly  poor — poor  in  possession,  and  dissolute  in  moral 
habit ;  and  he  will  then  naturally  covet  the  money  which  the 
other  has  saved.  And  if  he  is  then  allowed  to  attack  the 
other,  and  rob  him  of  his  well-earned  wealth,  there  is  no  more 
any  motive  for  saving,  or  any  reward  for  good  conduct ;  and 
all  society  is  thereupon  dissolved,  or  exists  only  in  systems  of 
rapine.  Therefore  the  first  necessity  of  social  life  is  the  clear- 
ness of  national  conscience  in  enforcing  the  law — that  he 
should  keep  who  has  justly  earned. 

That  law,  I  say,  is  the  proper  basis  of  distinction  between 
rich  and  poor.  But  there  is  also  a  false  basis  of  distinction  ; 
namely,  the  power  held  over  those  who  earn  wealth  by  those 
who  levy  or  exact  it.  There  will  be  always  a  number  of  men 
who  would  fain  set  themselves  to  the  accumulation  of  wealth 
as  the  sole  object  of  their  lives.  Necessarily,  that  class  of 
men  is  an  uneducated  class,  inferior  in  intellect,  and  more  or 
less  cowardly.  It  is  physically  impossible  for  a  well-educated, 
intellectual,  or  brave  man  to  make  money  the  chief  object  of 
his  thoughts  ;  as  physically  impossible  as  it  is  for  him  to  make 
his  dinner  the  principal  object  of  them.  All  healthy  people 
like  their  dinners,  but  their  dinner  is  not  the  main  object  of 
their  lives.  So  all  healthily  minded  people  like  making  money 
— ought  to  like  it,  and  to  enjoy  the  sensation  of  winning  it; 
but  the  main  object  of  their  life  is  not  money  ;  it  is  some- 
thing better  than  money.  A  good  soldier,  for  instance,  mainly 
wishes  to  do  his  fighting  well,    He  is  glad  of  his  pay — very 


WOEK 


21 


properly  so,  and  justly  grumbles  when  you  keep  him  ten 
years  without  it— still,  his  main  notion  of  life  is  to  win  battles, 
not  to  be  paid  for  winning  them.  So  of  clergymen.  They 
like  pew-rents,  and  baptismal  fees,  of  course  ;  but  yet,  if  they 
are  brave  and  well  educated,  the  pew-rent  is  not  the  sole  ob- 
ject of  their  lives,  and  the  baptismal  fee  is  not  the  sole  pur- 
pose of  the  baptism  ;  the  clergyman's  object  is  essentially  to 
baptize  and  preach,  not  to  be  paid  for  preaching.  So  of  doc- 
tors. They  like  fees  no  doubt, — ought  to  like  them ;  yet  if 
they  are  brave  and  well  educated,  the  entire  object  of  their 
lives  is  not  fees.  They,  on  the  whole,  desire  to  cure  the  sick  ; 
and, — if  they  are  good  doctors,  and  the  choice  were  fairly  put 
to  them, — would  rather  cure  their  patient,  and  lose  their  fee, 
than  kill  him,  and  get  it.  And  so  with  all  other  brave  and 
rightly  trained  men  ;  their  work  is  first,  their  fee  second — 
very  important  always,  but  still  second.  But  in  every  nation, 
as  I  said,  there  are  a  vast  class  who  are  ill-educated,  cowardly, 
and  more  or  less  stupid.  And  with  these  people,  just  as  cer- 
tainly the  fee  is  first,  and  the  work  second,  as  with  brave 
people  the  work  is  first  and  the  fee  second.  And  this  is  no 
small  distinction.  It  is  the  whole  distinction  in  a  man  ;  dis- 
tinction between  life  and  death  in  him,  between  heaven  and 
hell  for  him.  You  cannot  serve  two  masters  ; — you  must  serve 
one  or  other.  If  your  work  is  first  with  you,  and  your  fee 
second,  work  is  your  master,  and  the  lord  of  work,  who  is 
God.  But  if  your  fee  is  first  with  you,  and  your  work 
second,  fee  is  your  master,  and  the  lord  of  fee,  who  is  the 
Devil ;  and  not  only  the  Devil,  but  the  lowest  of  devils — the 
'  least  erected  fiend  that  fell/  So  there  you  have  it  in  brief 
terms ;  Work  first — you  are  God's  servants  ;  Fee  first — you 
are  the  Fiend's.  And  it  makes  a  difference,  now  and  ever, 
believe  me,  whether  you  serve  Him  who  has  on  His  vesture 
and  thigh  written,  'King  of  Kings,'  and  whose  service  is  per- 
fect freedom  ;  or  him  on  whose  vesture  and  thigh  the  name  is 
written,  'Slave  of  Slaves,'  and  whose  service  is  perfect  slavery. 

However,  in  every  nation  there  are,  and  must  always  be,  a 
certain  number  of  these  Fiend's  servants,  who  have  it  princi- 
pally for  the  object  of  their  lives  to  make  money.    They  are 


28 


THE  CROWN  OF  WILD  OLIVE. 


always,  as  I  said,  more  or  less  stupid,  and  cat]  not  conceive  of 
anything  else  so  nice  as  money.  Stupidity  is  always  the 
basis  of  the  Judas  bargain.  We  do  great  injustice  to  Iscariot, 
in  thinking  him  wicked  above  all  common  wickedness.  He 
was  only  a  common  money-lover,  and,  like  all  money-lovers, 
didn't  understand  Christ  ; — couldn't  make  out  the  worth  of 
Him,  or  meaning  of  Him.  He  didn't  want  Him  to  be  killed. 
He  was  horror-struck  when  he  found  that  Christ  would  be 
killed  ;  threw  his  money  away  instantly,  and  hanged  himself. 
How  many  of  our  present  money-seekers,  think  you,  would 
have  the  grace  to  hang  themselves,  whoever  was  killed  ?  But 
Judas  was  a  common,  selfish,  muddle-headed,  pilfering  fel- 
low ;  his  hand  always  in  the  bag  of  the  poor,  not  caring  for 
them.  He  didn't  understand  Christ ; — yet  believed  in  Him, 
much  more  than  most  of  us  do ;  had  seen  Him  do  miracles, 
thought  He  was  quite  strong  enough  to  shift  for  Himself,  and 
he,  Judas,  might  as  well  make  his  own  little  bye-perquisites 
out  of  the  affair.  Christ  would  come  out  of  it  well  enough, 
and  he  have  his  thirty  pieces.  Now,  that  is  the  money-seek- 
er's idea,  all  over  the  world.  He  doesn't  hate  Christ,  but 
can't  understand  Him — doesn't  care  for  him — sees  no  good 
in  that  benevolent  business  ;  makes  his  own  little  job  out  of 
it  at  all  events,  come  what  will.  And  thus,  out  of  every  mass 
of  men,  you  have  a  certain  number  of  bag-men — your  *  fee- 
first  '  men,  whose  main  object  is  to  make  money.  And  they 
do  make  it — make  it  in  all  sorts  of  unfair  ways,  chiefly  by  the 
weight  and  force  of  money  itself,  or  what  is  called  the  power 
of  capital ;  that  is  to  say,  the  power  which  money,  once  ob- 
tained, has  over  the  labour  of  the  poor,  so  that  the  capitalist 
can  take  all  its  produce  to  himself,  except  the  labourer's  food. 
That  is  the  modern  Judas's  way  of  6  carrying  the  bag,'  and 
£  bearing  what  is  put  therein.' 

Nay,  but  (it  is  asked)  how  is  that  an  unfair  advantage? 
Has  not  the  man  who  has  worked  for  the  money  a  right  to 
use  it  as  he  best  can  ?  No  ;  in  this  respect,  money  is  now 
exactly  what  mountain  promontories  over  public  roads  were 
in  old  times.  The  barons  fought  for  them  fairly  :-— the  strong- 
est and  cunningest  got  them  ;  then  fortified  them,  and  made 


WORK. 


29 


everyone  who  passed  below  pay  toll.  Well,  capital  now  is 
exactly  what  crags  were  then.  Men  fight  fairly  (we  will,  at 
least,  grant  so  much,  though  it  is  more  than  we  ought)  for 
their  money  ;  but,  once  having  got  it,  the  fortified  millionaire 
can  make  everybody  who  passes  below  pay  toll  to  his  million, 
and  build  another  tower  of  his  money  castle.  And  I  can  tell 
you,  the  poor  vagrants  by  the  roadside  suffer  now  quite  as 
much  from  the  bag-baron,  as  ever  they  did  from  the  crag- 
baron.  Bags  and  crags  have  just  the  same  result  on  rags.  I 
have  not  time,  however,  to-night  to  show  you  In  how  many 
ways  the  power  of  capital  is  unjust ;  but  this  one  great  prin- 
ciple I  have  to  assert — you  will  find  it  quite  indisputably  true 
— that  whenever  money  is  the  principal  object  of  life  with 
either  man  or  nation,  it  is  both  got  ill,  and  spent  ill ;  and 
does  harm  both  in  the  getting  and  spending  ;  but  when  it  is 
not  the  principal  object,  it  and  all  other  things  will  be  well 
got,  and  well  spent.  And  here  is  the  test,  with  every  man, 
of  whether  money  is  the  principal  object  with  him,  or  not. 
If  in  mid-life  he  could  pause  and  say,  "  Now  I  have  enough  to 
live  upon,  I'll  live  upon  it ;  and  having  well  earned  it,  I  will 
also  well  spend  it,  and  go  out  of  the  world  poor,  as  I  came 
into  it,"  then  money  is  not  principal  with  him  ;  but  if,  having 
enough  to  live  upon  in  the  manner  befitting  his  character  and 
rank,  he  still  wants  to  make  more,  and  to  die  rich,  then 
money  is  the  principal  object  with  him,  and  it  becomes  a 
curse  to  himself,  and  generally  to  those  who  spend  it  after 
him.  For  you  know  it  must  be  spent  some  day  ;  the  only 
question  is  whether  the  man  who  makes  it  shall  spend  it,  or 
some  one  else.  And  generally  it  is  better  for  the  maker  to 
spend  it,  for  he  will  know  best  its  value  and  use.  This  is  the 
true  law  of  life.  And  if  a  man  does  not  choose  thus  to  spend 
his  money,  he  must  either  hoard  it  or  lend  it,  and  the  worst 
thing  he  can  generally  do  is  to  lend  it ;  for  borrowers  are 
nearly  always  ill-spenders,  and  it  is  with  lent  money  that  all 
evil  is  mainly  done,  and  all  unjust  war  protracted. 

For  observe  what  the  real  fact  is,  respecting  loans  to  for- 
eign military  governments,  and  how  strange  it  is.  If  your 
little  boy  came  to  you  to  ask  for  money  to  spend  in  squibs 


30 


THE  CROWN  OF  WILD  OLIVE. 


and  crackers,  you  would  think  twice  before  you  gave  it  him ; 
and  you  would  have  some  idea  that  it  was  wasted,  when  you 
saw  it  fly  off  in  fireworks,  even  though  he  did  no  mischief 
with  it.  But  the  Russian  children,  and  Austrian  children, 
come  to  you,  borrowing  money,  not  to  spend  in  innocent 
squibs,  but  in  cartridges  and  bayonets  to  attack  you  in  India 
with,  and  to  keep  down  all  noble  life  in  Italy  with,  and  to 
murder  Polish  women  and  children  with ;  and  that  you  will 
give  at  once,  because  they  pay  you  interest  for  it.  Now,  in 
order  to  pay  you  that  interest,  they  must  tax  every  working 
peasant  in  their  dominions  ;  and  on  that  work  you  live.  You 
therefore  at  once  rob  the  Austrian  peasant,  assassinate  or 
banish  the  Polish  peasant,  and  you  live  on  the  produce  of 
the  theft,  and  the  bribe  for  the  assassination  !  That  is  the 
broad  fact — that  is  the  practical  meaning  of  your  foreign  loans, 
and  of  most  large  interest  of  money  ;  and  then  you  quarrel 
with  Bishop  Colenso,  forsooth,  as  if  he  denied  the  Bible,  and 
you  believed  it !  though,  wretches  as  you  are,  every  deliberate 
act  of  your  lives  is  a  new  defiance  of  its  primary  orders  ;  and 
as  if,  for  most  of  the  rich  men  of  England  at  this  moment,  it 
were  not  indeed  to  be  desired,  as  the  best  thing  at  least  for 
them,  that  the  Bible  should  not  be  true,  since  against  them 
these  words  are  written  in  it :  '  The  rust  of  your  gold  and 
silver  shall  be  a  witness  against  you,  and  shall  eat  your  flesh, 
as  it  were  fire/ 

III.  I  pass  now  to  our  third  condition  of  separation,  be- 
tween the  men  who  work  with  the  hand,  and  those  who  work 
with  the  head. 

And  here  we  have  at  last  an  inevitable  distinction.  There 
must  be  work  done  by  the  arms,  or  none  of  us  could  live. 
There  must  be  work  done  by  the  brains,  or  the  life  we  get 
would  not  be  worth  having.  And  the  same  men  cannot  do 
both.  There  is  rough  work  to  be  done,  and  rough  men  must 
do  it  ;  there  is  gentle  work  to  be  done,  and  gentlemen  must  do 
it ;  and  it  is  physically  impossible  that  one  class  should 
do,  or  divide,  the  work  of  the  other.  And  it  is  of  no  use  to 
try  to  conceal  this  sorrowful  fact  by  fine  words,  and  to  talk  to 
the  workman  about  the  honourableness  of  manual  labour. 


WORK. 


31 


and  the  dignify  of  humanity.  That  is  a  grand  old  proverh 
of  Sancho  Panza's,  '  Fine  words  butter  no  parsnips ; '  and  I 
cap  tell  you  that,  all  over  England  just  now,  you  workmen 
are  buying  a  great  deal  too  much  butter  at  that  dairy.  Kough 
work,  honourable  or  not,  takes  the  life  out  of  us  ;  and  the  man 
who  has  been  heaving  clay  out  of  a  ditch  all  day,  or  driving 
an  express  train  against  the  north  wind  all  night,  or  hold- 
ing a  collier's  helm  in  a  gale  on  a  lee-shore,  or  whirling  white 
hot  iron  at  a  furnace  mouth,  that  man  is  not  the  same  at  the 
end  of  his  day,  or  night,  as  one  who  has  been  sitting  in  a  quiet 
room,  with  everything  comfortable  about  him,  reading  books, 
or  classing  butterflies,  or  painting  pictures.  If  it  is  any  com- 
fort to  you  to  be  told  that  the  rough  work  is  the  more  hon- 
ourable of  the  two,  I  should  be  sorry  to  take  that  much  of 
consolation  from  you  ;  and  in  some  sense  I  need  not.  The 
rough  work  is  at  all  events  real,  honest,  and,  generally,  though 
not  always,  useful ;  while  the  fine  work  is,  a  great  deal  of  it, 
foolish  and  false  as  well  as  fine,  and  therefore  dishonourable  ; 
but  when  both  kinds  are  equally  well  and  worthily  done,  the 
head's  is  the  noble  work,  and  the  hand's  the  ignoble  ;  and  of 
all  hand  work  whatsoever,  necessary  for  the  maintenance  of 
life,  those  old  words,  '  In  the  sweat  of  thy  face  thou  shalt  eat 
bread/  indicate  that  the  inherent  nature  of  it  is  one  of  calam- 
ity ;  and  that  the  ground,  cursed  for  our  sake,  casts  also 
some  shadow  of  degradation  into  our  contest  with  its  thorn 
and  its  thistle  ;  so  that  all  nations  have  held  their  days  hon- 
ourable, or  £holy,'  and  constituted  them  'holy days'  or  'holi- 
days,' by  making  them  days  of  rest ;  and  the  promise,  which, 
among  all  our  distant  hopes,  seems  to  cast  the  chief  bright- 
ness over  death,  is  that  blessing  of  the  dead  who  die  in  the 
Lord,  that  '  they  rest  from  their  labours,  and  their  works  do 
follow  them.' 

And  thus  the  perpetual  question  and  contest  must  arise, 
who  is  to  do  this  rough  work  ?  and  how  is  the  worker  of  it 
to  be  comforted,  redeemed,  and  rewarded  ?  and  what  kind  of 
play  should  he  have,  and  what  rest,  in  this  world,  sometimes, 
as  well  as  in  the  next  ?  Well,  my  good  working  friends, 
these  questions  will  take  a  little  time  to  answer  yet.  They 


32 


THE  CROWN  OF  WILD  OLIVE. 


must  be  answered  :  all  good  men  are  occupied  with  them, 
and  all  honest  thinkers.  There's  grand  head  work  doing 
about  them  ;  but  much  must  be  discovered,  and  much  at- 
tempted  in  vain,  before  anything  decisive  can  be  told  you. 
Only  note  these  few  particulars,  which  are  already  sure. 

As  to  the  distribution  of  the  hard  work.  None  of  us,  or 
very  few  of  us,  do  either  hard  or  soft  work  because  wre  think 
we  ought ;  but  because  we  have  chanced  to  fall  into  the  way 
of  it,  and  cannot  help  ourselves.  Now,  nobody  does  anything 
well  that  they  cannot  help  doing :  work  is  only  done  well 
when  it  is  done  with  a  will ;  and  no  man  has  a  thoroughly 
sound  will  unless  he  knows  he  is  doing  what  he  should,  and 
is  in  his  place.  And,  depend  upon  it,  all  work  must  be  done 
at  last,  not  in  a  disorderly,  scrambling,  doggish  wa}^,  but  in 
an  ordered,  soldierly,  human  way — a  lawful  way.  Men  are  en- 
listed for  the  labour  that  kills — the  labour  of  war  :  they  are 
counted,  trained,  fed,  dressed,  and  praised  for  that.  Let  them 
be  enlisted  also  for  the  labour  that  feeds  :  let  them  be  counted, 
trained,  fed,  dressed,  praised  for  that.  Teach  the  plough  ex- 
ercise as  carefully  as  you  do  the  sword  exercise,  and  let  the 
officers  of  troops  of  life  be  held  as  much  gentlemen  as  the 
officers  of  troops  of  death  ;  and  all  is  done  :  but  neither  this, 
nor  any  other  right  thing,  can  be  accomplished — you  can't 
even  see  your  way  to  it — unless,  first  of  all,  both  servant  and 
master  are  resolved  that,  come  w7hat  will  of  it,  they  will  do 
each  other  justice.  People  are  perpetually  squabbling  about 
what  will  be  best  to  do,  or  easiest  to  do,  or  adviseablest  to  do, 
or  profitablest  to  do ;  but  they  nover,  so  far  as  I  hear  them 
talk,  ever  ask  what  it  is  just  to  do.  And  it  is  the  law  of 
heaven  that  you  shall  not  be  able  to  judge  what  is  wise  or 
easy,  unless  you  are  first  resolved  to  judge  what  is  just,  and 
to  do  it.  That  is  the  one  thing  constantly  reiterated  by  our 
Master — the  order  of  all  others  that  is  given  oftenest — c  Do 
justice  and  judgment.'  That's  your  Bible  order  ;  that's  the 
'Service  of  God,'  not  praying  nor  psalm-singing.  You  are 
told,  indeed,  to  sing  psalms  when  you  are  merry,  and  to  pray 
when  you  need  anything  ;  and,  by  the  perversion  of  the  Evil 
Spirit,  we  get  to  t>*^k  that  praying  and  psalm-singing  are 


WORK 


S3 


service/  If  a  child  finds  itself  in  want  of  anything,  it  runs 
in  and  asks  its  father  for  it — does  it  call  that,  doing  its  father 
a  service  ?  If  it  begs  for  a  toy  or  a  piece  of  cake — does  it 
call  that  serving  its  father?  That,  with  God,  is  prayer,  and 
He  likes  to  hear  it :  He  likes  you  to  ask  Him  for  cake  when 
you  want  it ;  but  He  doesn't  call  that  Serving  ffim.1  Beg- 
ging  is  not  serving  :  God  likes  mere  beggars  as  little  as  you 
do — He  likes  honest  servants,  not  beggars.  So  when  a  child 
loves  its  father  very  much,  and  is  very  happy,  it  may  sing 
little  songs  about  him  ;  but  it  doesn't  call  that  serving  its 
father  ;  neither  is  singing  songs  about  God,  serving  God.  It 
is  enjoying  ourselves,  if  it's  anything ;  most  probably  it  is 
nothing  ;  but  if  it's  anything,  it  is  serving  ourselves,  not  God. 
And  yet  we  are  impudent  enough  to  call  our  beggings  and 
chauntings  £  Divine  Service  : '  we  say  6  Divine  service  will  bo 
"  performed  "  '  (that's  our  word — the  form  of  it  gone  through) 
'at  eleven  o'clock.'  Alas  ! — unless  we  perform  Divine  service 
in  every  willing  act  of  our  life,  we  never  perform  it  at  all. 
The  one  Divine  work — the  one  ordered  sacrifice — is  to  do 
justice  ;  and  it  is  the  last  we  are  ever  inclined  to  do.  Any- 
thing rather  than  that !  As  much  charity  as  you  choose,  but 
no  justice.  6  Nay,'  you  will  say,  ( charity  is  greater  than  jus- 
tice.' Yes,  it  is  greater  ;  it  is  the  summit  of  justice — it  is  the 
temple  of  which  justice  is  the  foundation.  But  you  can't  have 
the  top  without  the  bottom  ;  you  cannot  build  upon  charity. 
You  must  build  upon  j  ustice,  for  this  main  reason,  that  you 
have  not,  at  first,  charity  to  build  with.  It  is  the  last  reward 
of  good  work.  Do  justice  to  your  brother  (you  can  do  that, 
whether  you  love  him  or  not),  and  you  will  come  to  love  him. 
But  do  injustice  to  him,  because  you  don't  love  him  ;  and 
you  will  come  to  hate  him.  It  is  all  very  fine  to  think  you 
can  build  upon  charity  to  begin  with  ;  but  you  will  find  all 
you  have  got  to  begin  with,  begins  at  home,  and  is  essentially 
love  of  yourself.  You  well-to-do  people,  for  instance,  who* 
are  here  to  night,  will  go  to  '  Divine  service '  next  Sunday, 
all  nice  and  tidy,  and  your  little  children  will  have  their  tight 
little  Sunday  boots  on,  and  lovely  little  Sunday  feathers  in 
their  hats  ;  and  you'll  think,  complacently  and  piously,  how 
3 


34 


THE  CROWN  OF  WILD  OLIVE. 


lovely  they  look !  So  tliey  do  :  and  you  love  them  heartily, 
and  you  like  sticking  feathers  in  their  hats.  That's  all  right', 
that  is  charity  ;  but  it  is  charity  beginning  at  home.  Then 
you  will  come  to  the  poor  little  crossing-sweeper,  got  up  also, 
— it,  in  its  Sunday  dress, — the  dirtiest  rags  it  has, — that  it: 
may  beg  the  better  :  we  shall  give  it  a  penny,  and  think  how 
good  we  are.  That's  charity  going  abroad.  But  what  does 
J astice  say,  walking  and  watching  near  us  ?  Christian  Jus* 
tice  has  been  strangely  mute,  and  seemingly  blind ;  and,  if 
not  blind,  decrepit,  this  many  a  day :  she  keeps  her  accounts 
still,  however — quite  steadily — doing  them  at  nights,  care- 
fully, with  her  bandage  off,  and  through  acutest  spectacles 
(the  only  modern  scientific  invention  she  cares  about).  You 
must  put  your  ear  down  ever  so  close  to"  her  lips  to  hear  her 
speak  ;  and  then  you  will  start  at  what  she  first  wThispers,  for 
it  will  certainly  be,  *  Why  shouldn't  that  little  crossing-sweeper 
have  a  feather  on  its  head,  as  well  as  your  own  child  ? '  Then 
you  may  ask  Justice,  in  an  amazed  manner,  '  How  she  can 
possibly  be  so  foolish  as  to  think  children  could  sweep  cross- 
ings with  feathers  on  their  heads  ?  '  Then  you  stoop  again, 
and  Justice  says — still  in  her  dull,  stupid  way — 'Then,  why 
don't  you,  every  other  Sunday,  leave  your  child  to  sweep  the 
crossing,  and  take  the  little  sweeper  to  church  in  a  hat  and 
feather  ?  '  Mercy  on  us  (you  think),  what  will  she  say  next  ? 
And  you  answer,  of  course,  that  'you  don't,  because  every 
body  ought  to  remain  content  in  the  position  in  which  Prov- 
idence has  placed  them.'  Ah,  my  friends,  that's  the  gist  of 
the  whole  question.  Did  Providence  put  them  in  that  posi- 
tion, or  did  you  f  You  knock  a  man  into  a  ditch,  and  then 
you  tell  him  to  remain  content  in  the  \  position  in  which 
Providence  has  placed  him.'  That's  modern  Christianity. 
You  say — '  We  did  not  knock  him  into  the  ditch.'  How  do 
you  know  what  you  have  done,  or  are  doing?  That's  just 
what  we  have  all  got  to  know,  and  what  wTe  shall  never  know, 
until  the  question  with  us  every  morning,  is,  not  how  to  do 
the  gainful  thing,  but  how  to  do  the  just  thing  ;  nor  until  we 
are  at  least  so  far  on  the  way  to  being  Christian,  as  to  have 
Understood  that  in^un  of  the  poor  half-way  Mahometan, 


WORK. 


'One  hour  in  the  execution  of  justice  is  worth  seventy  years 
of  prayer/ 

Supposing,  then,  we  have  it  determined  with  appropriate 
justice,  who  is  to  do  the  hand  work,  the  next  questions  must 
be  how  the  hand- workers  are  to  be  paid,  and  how  Tthey  are 
to  be  refreshed,  and  what  play  they  are  to  have.  Now,  the 
possible  quantity  of  play  depends  on  the  possible  quantity  of 
pay ;  and  the  quantity  of  pay  is  not  a  matter  for  considera- 
tion to  hand- workers  only,  but  to  all  workers.  Generally, 
good,  useful  work,  whether  of  the  hand  or  head,  is  either  ill- 
paid,  or  not  paid  at  all.  I  don't  say  it  should  be  so,  but  it 
always  is  so.  People,  as  a  rule,  only  pay  for  being  amused  or 
being  cheated,  not  for  being  served.  Five  thousand  a  year 
to  your  talker,  and  a  shilling  a  day  to  your  fighter,  digger, 
and  thinker,  is  the  rule.  None  of  the  best  head  work  in  art, 
literature,  or  science,  is  ever  paid  for.  How  much  do  you 
think  Homer  got  for  his  Iliad  ?  or  Dante  for  his  Paradise  ? 
only  bitter  bread  and  salt,  and  going  up  and  down  other  peo- 
ple's stairs.  In  science,  the  man  who  discovered  the  tele- 
scope, and  first  saw  heaven,  was  paid  with  a  dungeon  ;  the 
man  who  invented  the  microscope,  and  first  saw  earth,  died 
of  starvation,  driven  from  his  home  :  it  is  indeed  very  clear 
that  God  means  all  thoroughly  good  work  and  talk  to  be 
done  for  nothing.  Baruch,  the  scribe,  did  not  get  a  penny  a 
line  for  writing  Jeremiah's  second  roll  for  him,  I  fancy  ;  and 
St.  Stephen  did  not  get  bishop's  pay  for  that  long  sermon  of 
his  to  the  Pharisees  ;  nothing  but  stones.  For  indeed  that  is 
the  world-father's  proper  payment.  So  surely  as  any  of  the 
world's  children  work  for  the  world's  good,  honestly,  with 
head  and  heart ;  and  come  to  it,  saying,  c  Give  us  a  little 
bread,  just  to  keep  the  life  in  us,'  the  world-father  answers 
them,  '  No,  my  children,  not  bread  ;  a  stone,  if  you  like,  or  as 
many  as  you  need,  to  keep  you  quiet.'  But  the  hand- workers 
are  not  so  ill  off  as  ail  this  comes  to.  The  worst  that  can  hap- 
pen to  you  is  to  break  stones  ;  not  be  broken  by  them.  And 
for  you  there  will  come  a  time  for  better  payment ;  some  day, 
assuredly,  more  pence  will  be  paid  to  Peter  the  Fisherman, 
and  fewer  to  Peter  the  Pope  ;  we  shall  pay  people  not  quite 


36 


THE  CROWN  OF  WILD  OLIVE, 


so  much  for  talking  in  Parliament  and  doing  nothing,  as  for 
holding  their  tongues  out  of  it  and  doing  something  ;  we 
shall  pay  our  ploughman  a  little  more  and  our  lawyer  a  little 
less,  and^  so  on  :  but,  at  least,  we  may  even  now  take  care 
that  whatever  work  is  done  shall  be  fully  paid  for  ;  and  the 
man  who  does  it  paid  for  it,  not  somebody  else  ;  and  that  it 
shall  be  done  in  an  orderly,  soldierly,  well-guided,  wholesome 
way,  under  good  captains  and  lieutenants  of  labour  ;  and  that 
it  shall  have  its  appointed  times  of  rest,  and  enough  of  them  ; 
and  that  in  those  times  the  play  shall  be  wholesome  play,  not 
in  theatrical  gardens,  with  tin  flowers  and  gas  sunshine,  and 
girls  dancing  because  of  their  misery  ;  but  in  true  gardens, 
with  real  flowers,  and  real  sunshine,  and  children  dancing  be- 
cause of  their  gladness ;  so  that  truly  the  streets  shall  be  full 
(the  *  streets,'  mind  you,  not  the  gutters)  of  children,  playing 
in  the  midst  thereof.  We  may  take  care  that  working-men 
shall  have  at  least  as  good  books  to  read  as  anybody  else, 
when  they've  time  to  read  them  ;  and  as  comfortable  firesides 
to  sit  at  as  anybody  else,  when  they've  time  to  sit  at  them. 
This,  I  think,  can  be  managed  for  you,  my  working  friends, 
in  the  good  time. 

IV.  I  must  go  on,  however,  to  our  last  head,  concerning 
ourselves  all,  as  workers.  What  is  wise  work,  and  what  is 
foolish  work  ?  What  the  difference  between  sense  and  non- 
sense, in  daily  occupation  ? 

Well,  wise  work  is,  briefly,  work  with  God.  Foolish  work 
is  work  against  God.  And  work  done  with  God,  which  He 
will  help,  may  be  briefly  described  as  '  Putting  in  Order  '— 
that  is,  enforcing  God's  law  of  order,  spiritual  and  material, 
over  men  and  things.  The  first  thing  you  have  to  do,  essen- 
tially ;  the  real  6  good  work '  is,  with  respect  to  men,  to  en- 
force justice,  and  with  respect  to  things,  to  enforce  tidiness, 
and  fruitfulness.  And  against  these  two  great  human  deeds, 
justice  and  order,  there  are  perpetually  two  great  demons 
contending, — the  devil  of  iniquity,  or  inequity,  and  the  devil 
of  disorder,  or  of  death ;  for  death  is  only  consummation  of 
disorder.  You  have  to  fight  these  two  fiends  daily.  So  far 
as  you  don't  fight  against  the  fiend  of  iniquity,  you  work  fox 


WORK. 


37 


him,  You  'work  iniquity/  and  the  judgment  upon  you,  foi 
all  your  '  Lord,  Lord's/  will  be  ■  Depart  from  me,  ye  that  work 
iniquity.'  And  so  far  as  you  do  not  resist  the  fiend  of  disor- 
der, you  work  disorder,  and  you  yourself  do  the  work  of 
Death,  which  is  sin,  and  has  for  its  wages,  Death  himself. 

Observe  then,  all  wise  work  is  mainly  threefold  in  charac- 
ter.   It  is  honest,  useful,  and  cheerful. 

I.  It  is  honest.  I  hardly  know  anything  more  strange  than 
that  you  recognise  honesty  in  play,  and  you  do  not  in  work. 
In  your  lightest  games,  you  have  always  some  one  to  see 
what  you  call  'fair-play.'  In  boxing,  you  must  hit  fair  ;  in 
racing,  start  fair.  Your  English  watchword  is  fair-play,  your 
English  hatred,  foul-play.  Did  it  ever  strike  you  that  you 
wanted  another  watchword  also,  fair-work,  and  another  hatred 
also,  foul-work  ?  Your  prize-fighter  has  some  honour  in  him 
yet ;  and  so  have  the  men  in  the  ring  round  him  :  they  will 
judge  him  to  lose  the  match,  by  foul  hitting.  But  your 
prize-merchant  gains  his  match  by  foul  selling,  and  no  one 
cries  out  against  that.  You  drive  a  gambler  out  of  the  gam- 
bling-room who  loads  dice,  but  you  leave  a  tradesman  in  flour- 
ishing business,  who  loads  scales  !  For  observe,  all  dishonest 
dealing  is  loading  scales.  What  does  it  matter  whether  I  get 
short  weight,  adulterate  substance,  or  dishonest  fabric  ?  The 
fault  in  the  fabric  is  incomparably  the  worst  of  the  two. 
Give  me  short  measure  of  food,  and  I  only  lose  by  you  ;  but 
give  me  adulterate  food,  and  I  die  by  you.  Here,  then,  is 
your  chief  duty,  you  workmen  and  tradesmen — to  be  true  to 
yourselves,  and  to  us  who  would  help  you.  We  can  do  nothing 
for  you,  nor  you  for  yourselves,  Avithout  honesty.  Get  that, 
you  get  all ;  without  that,  your  suffrages,  your  reforms,  your 
free-trade  measures,  your  institutions  of  science,  are  all  in 
vain.  It  is  useless  to  put  your  heads  together,  if  you  can't 
put  your  hearts  together.  Shoulder  to  shoulder,  right  hand 
to  right  hand,  among  yourselves,  and  no  wrong  hand  to  any- 
body else,  and  you'll  win  the  world  }ret. 

II.  Then,  secondly,  wise  work  is  useful.  No  man  mind% 
or  ought  to  mind,  its  being  hard,  if  only  it  comes  to  some* 
thing  ;  but  when  it  is  hard,  and  comes  to  nothing  ;  when  al] 


THE  CROWN  OF  WILD  OLIVE, 


our  bees'  business  turns  to  spiders' ;  and  for  honey-comb  we 
have  only  resultant  cobweb,  blown  awTay  by  the  next  breeze — 
that  is  the  cruel  thing  for  the  worker.  Yet  do  we  ever  ask 
ourselves,  personally,  or  even  nationally,  whether  our  work  is 
coming  to  anything  or  not  ?  We  don't  care  to  keep  what  has 
been  nobly  done  ;  still  less  do  we  care  to  do  nobly  what 
others  would  keep  ;  and,  least  of  all,  to  make  the  work  itself 
useful  instead  of  deadly  to  the  doer,  so  as  to  use  his  life  in- 
deed, but  not  to  waste  it.  Of  all  wastes,  the  greatest  waste 
that  you  can  commit  is  the  waste  of  labour.  If  you  went 
down  in  the  morning  into  yt>ur  dairy,  and  }tou  found  that 
your  youngest  child  had  got  down  before  you  ;  and  that  he 
and  the  cat  were  at  play  together,  and  that  he  had  poured  out 
all  the  cream  on  the  floor  for  the  cat  to  lap  up,  you  would 
scold  the  child,  and  be  sorry  the  milk  was  wasted.  But  if, 
instead  of  wooden  bowls  with  milk  in  them,  there  are  golden 
bowls  with  human  life  in  them,  and  instead  of  the  cat  to  play 
with — the  devil  to  play  with  ;  and  you  yourself  the  player ; 
and  instead  of  leaving  that  golden  bowl  to  be  broken  by  God 
at  the  fountain,  you  break  it  in  the  dust  yourself,  and  pour 
the  human  blood  out  on  the  ground  for  the-fiend  to  lick  up — • 
that  is  no  waste  !  What !  you  perhaps  think,  6  to  waste  the  la- 
bour of  men  is  not  to  kill  them.'  Is  it  not  ?  I  should  like  in 
know  how  you  could  kill  them  more  utterly — kill  them  with 
second  deaths,  seventh  deaths,  hundredfold  deaths  ?  It  is  the 
slightest  way  of  killing  to  stop  a  man's  breath.  Nay,  the  hun- 
ger, and  the  cold,  and  the  little  whistling  bullets — our  love-mes- 
sengers between  nation  and  nation — have  brought  pleasant 
messages  from  us  to  many  a  man  before  now  ;  orders  of  sweet 
release,  and  leave  at  last  to  go  where  he  will  be  most  welcome 
and  most  happy.  At  the  worst  you  do  but  shorten  his  life, 
you  do  not  corrupt  his  life.  But  if  you  put  him  to  base  la- 
bour, if  you  bind  his  thoughts,  if  you  blind  his  eyes,  if  you 
blunt  his  hopes,  if  you  steal  his  joys,  if  you  stunt  his  body, 
and  blast  his  soul,  and  at  last  leave  him  not  so  much  as  to 
reap  the  poor  fruit  of  his  degradation,  but  gather  that  fox 
yourself,  and  dismiss  him  to  the  grave,  when  you  have  dono 
with  him,  having,  so  far  as  in  you  lay,  made  the  walls  of  that 


WORK. 


39 


grave  everlasting  (though,  indeed,  I  fancy  the  goodly  bricks 
of  some  of  our  family  vaults  will  hold  closer  in  the  resurrec* 
tion  day  than  the  sod  over  the  labourer's  head),  this  you  thin!* 
is  no  waste,  and  no  sin  ! 

III.  Then,  lastly,  wise  work  is  cheerful,  as  a  child's  work 
is.  And  now  I  want  you  to  take  one  thought  home  with  you* 
and  let  it  stay  with  you. 

Everybody  in  this  room  has  been  taught  to  pray  daily,  4  Thy 
kingdom  come.'  Now,  if  we  hear  a  man  swear  in  the  streets, 
we  think  it  very  wrong,  and  say  he  'takes  God's  name  in  vain.' 
But  there's  a  twenty  times  worse  way  of  taking  His  name  in 
vain,  than  that.  It  is  to  ask  God  for  what  we  don't  want.  He 
doesn't  like  that  sort  of  prayer.  If  you  don't  want  a  thing, 
don't  ask  for  it :  such  asking  is  the  worst  mockery  of  your 
King  you  can  mock  Him  with  ;  the  soldiers  striking  Him  on 
the  head  with  the  reed  was  nothing  to  that.  If  you  do  not 
wish  for  His  kingdom,  don't  pray  for  it.  But  if  you  do,  you 
must  do  more  than  pray  for  it ;  you  must  work  for  it.  And, 
to  work  for  it,  you  must  know  what  it  is  :  we  have  all  prayed 
for  it  many  a  day  without  thinking.  Observe,  it  is  a  kingdom 
that  is  to  come  to  us  ;  we  are  not  to  go  to  it.  Also,  it  is  not  to 
be  a  kingdom  of  the  dead,  but  of  the  living.  Also,  it  is  not 
to  come  all  at  once,  but  quietly  ;  nobody  knows  how.  '  The 
kingdom  of  God  cometh  not  with  observation.'  Also,  it  is  not 
to  come  outside  of  us,  but  in  the  hearts  of  us  :  'the  kingdom 
of  God  is  within  you.'  And,  being  within  us,  it  is  not  a  thing 
to  be  seen,  but  to  be  felt ;  and  though  it  brings  all  substance 
of  good  with  it,  it  does  not  consist  in  that :  '  the  kingdom  of 
God  is  not  meat  and  drink,  but  righteousness,  peace,  and  joy 
in  the  Holy  Ghost : '  joy,  that  is  to  say,  in  the  holy,  healthful, 
and  helpful  Spirit.  Now,  if  we  want  to  work  for  this  kingdom, 
and  to  bring  it,  and  enter  into  it,  there's  just  one  condition  to 
be  first  accepted.  You  must  enter  it  as  children,  or  not  at 
all ;  '  "Whosoever  will  not  receive  it  as  a  little  child  shall  not 
enter  therein.'  And  again,  'Suffer  little  children  to  come 
unto  me,  and  forbid  them  not,  for  of  such  is  the  kingdom  of 
heaven.' 

Of  such,  observe.    Not  of  children  themselves,  but  of  such 


*0  TEE  CROWN  OF  WILD  OLIVE. 

as  children.  I  believe  most  mothers  who  read  that  text  thini 
that  all  heaven  is  to  be  full  of  babies.  But  that's  not  so. 
There  will  be  children  there,  but  the  hoary  head  is  the  crown. 
'Length  of  days,  and  long  life  and  peace/  that  is  the  blessing, 
not  to  die  in  babyhood.  Children  die  but  for  their  parentar 
sins  ;  God  means  them  to  live,  but  He  can't  let  them  always ; 
then  they  have  their  earlier  place  in  heaven  :  and  the  little 
child  of  David,  vainly  prayed  for ; — the  little  child  of  Jero- 
boam, killed  b}r  its  mother's  step  on  its  own  threshold, — they 
will  be  there.  But  weary  old  David,  and  weary  old  Barzillai, 
having  learned  children's  lessons  at  last,  will  be  there  too : 
and  the  one  question  for  us  all,  young  or  old,  is,  have  we 
learned  our  child's  lesson?  it  is  the  character  of  children  we 
want,  and  must  gain  at  our  peril  ;  let  us  see,  briefly,  in  what 
it  consists. 

The  first  character  of  right  childhood  is  that  it  is  Modest.  A 
well-bred  child  does  not  think  it  can  teach  its  parents,  or  that 
it  knows  everything.  It  may  think  its  father  and  mother 
know  everything, — perhaps  that  all  grown-up  people  know 
everything  ;  very  certainly  it  is  sure  that  it  does  not.  And  it 
is  always  asking  questions,  and  wanting  to  know  more.  Well, 
that  is  the  first  character  of  a  good  and  wise  man  at  his  work. 
To  know  that  he  knows  very  little ; — to  perceive  that  there 
are  many  above  him  wiser  than  he  ;  and  to  be  always  asking 
questions,  wanting  to  learn,  not  to  teach.  No  one  ever  teaches 
well  who  wants  to  teach,  or  governs  well  wTho  wants  to  govern ; 
it  is  an  old  saying  (Plato's,  but  I  know  not  if  his,  first),  and  as 
wise  as  old. 

Then,  the  second  character  of  right  childhood  is  to  be  Faith- 
ful. Perceiving  that  its  father  knows  best  what  is  good  for  it, 
and  having  found  always,  when  it  has  tried  its  own  way  against 
his,  that  he  was  right  and  it  was  wrong,  a  noble  child  trusts 
him  at  last  wholly,  gives  him  its  hand,  and  will  walk  blindfold 
with  him,  if  he  bids  it.  And  that  is  the  true  character  of  all 
good  men  also,  as  obedient  workers,  or  soldiers  under  cap- 
tains. They  must  trust  their  captains  ; — they  are  bound  iox 
their  lives  to  choose  none  but  those  whom  they  can  trust. 
Then,  they  are  not  always  to  be  thinking  that  what  seems 


WORK. 


41 


strange  to  them,  or  wrong  in  what  they  are  desired  to  do,  is 
strange  or  wrong.  They  know  their  captain  :  where  he  leads 
they  must  follow,  what  he  bids,  they  must  do  ;  and  without 
this  trust  and  faith,  without  this  captainship  and  soldiership, 
no  great  deed,  no  great  salvation,  is  possible  to  man.  Among 
all  the  nations  it  is  only  when  this  faith  is  attained  by  them 
that  they  become  great :  the  Jew,  the  Greek,  and  the  Mahome- 
tan, agree  at  least  in  testifying  to  this.  It  was  a  deed  of  this 
absolute  trust  which  made  Abraham  the  father  of  the  faithful ; 
it  was  the  declaration  of  the  power  of  God  as  captain  over  all 
men,  and  the  acceptance  of  a  leader  appointed  by  Him  as 
commander  of  the  faithful,  which  laid  the  foundation  of  what- 
ever national  power  yet  exists  in  the  East ;  and  the  deed  of 
the  Greeks,  which  has  become  the  type  of  unselfish  and  noble 
soldiership  to  all  lands,  and  to  all  times,  was  commemorated, 
on  the  tomb  of  those  who  gave  their  lives  to  do  it,  in  the  most 
pathetic,  so  far  as  I  know,  or  can  feel,  of  all  human  utterances  : 
'  Oh,  stranger,  go  and  tell  our  people  that  we  are  lying  here, 
having  obeyed  their  words.' 

Then  the  third  character  of  right  childhood  is  to  be  Loving 
and  Generous.  Give  a  little  love  to  a  child,  and  you  get  a 
great  deal  back.  It  loves  everything  near  it,  when  it  is  a  right 
kind  of  child — would  hurt  nothing,  would  give  the  best  it  has 
away,  always,  if  you  need  it — does  not  lay  plans  for  getting 
everything  in  the  house  for  itself,  and  delights  in  helping- 
people  ;  you  cannot  please  it  so  much  as  by  giving  it  a  chance 
of  being  useful,  in  ever  so  little  a  way. 

And  because  of  all  these  characters,  lastly,  it  is  Cheerful. 
Putting  its  trust  in  its  father,  it  is  careful  for  nothing — be- 
ing full  of  love  to  every  creature,  it  is  happy  always,  whether 
in  its  play  or  in  its  duty.  Well,  that's  the  great  worker's 
character  also.  Taking  no  thought  for  the  morrow ;  taking 
thought  only  for  the  duty  of  the  day  ;  trusting  somebody  else 
to  take  care  of  to-morrow  ;  knowing  indeed  what  labour  is, 
but  not  what  sorrow  is  ;  and  always  ready  for  play — beautiful 
play, — for  lovely  human  play  is  like  the  play  of  the  Sun. 
There's  a  worker  for  you.  He,  steady  to  his  time,  is  set  as 
a  strong  man  to  run  his  course,  but  also,  he  rejoiceth  as  a 


12  THE  CROWJV  OF  WILD  OLIVE. 

strong  man  to  run  his  course.  See  how  he  plays  in  the 
morning,  with  the  mists  below,  and  the  clouds  above,  with  a 
ray  here  and  a  flash  there,  and  a  shower  of  jewels  everywhere  ; 
that's  the  Sun's  play  ;  and  great  human  play  is  like  his — all 
various — all  full  of  light  and  life,  and  tender,  as  the  dew  of 
the  morning. 

So  then,  you  have  the  child's  character  in  these  four  things 
— Humility,  Faith,  Charity,  and  Cheerfulness.  That's  what 
you  have  got  to  be  converted  to.  '  Except  ye  be  converted 
and  become  as  little  children  ' — You  hear  much  of  conversion 
now-a-days ;  but  people  always  seem  to  think  they  have  got 
to  be  made  wretched  by  conversion, — to  be  converted  to  long 
faces.  No,  friends,  you  have  got  to  be  converted  to  short 
ones ;  you  have  to  repent  into  childhood,  to  repent  into  de- 
light, and  delightsomeness.  You  can't  go  into  a  conventicle 
but  you'll  hear  plenty  of  talk  of  backsliding.  Backsliding, 
indeed  !  I  can  tell  you,  on  the  ways  most  of  us  go,  the  faster 
we  slide  back  the  better.  Slide  back  into  the  cradle,  if  going 
on  is  into  the  grave — back,  I  tell  you ;  back — out  of  your 
long  faces,  and  into  your  long  clothes.  It  is  among  children 
only,  and  as  children  only,  that  you  will  find  medicine  for 
your  healing  and  true  wisdom  for  your  teaching.  There  is 
poison  in  the  counsels  of  the  men  of  this  world  ;  the  words 
they  speak  are  all  bitterness,  '  the  poison  of  asps  is  under 
their  lips,'  but,  '  the  sucking  child  shall  play  by  the  hole  of 
the  asp.'  There  is  death  in  the  looks  of  men.  '  Their  eyes 
are  privily  set  against  the  poor  ; ■  they  are  as  the  uncharmable 
serpent,  the  cockatrice,  which  slew  by  seeing.  But  '  the  weaned 
child  shall  lay  his  hand  on  the  cockatrice  den.'  There  is 
death  in  the  steps  of  men :  '  their  feet  are  swift  to  shed 
blood  ;  they  have  compassed  us  in  our  steps  like  the  lion  that 
is  greedy  of  his  prey,  and  the  young  lion  lurking  in  secret 
places,'  but,  in  that  kingdom,  the  wolf  shall  lie  down  with  the 
lamb,  and  the  fatling  with  the  lion,  and  £a  little  child  shall 
lead  them.'  There  is  death  in  the  thoughts  of  men :  the 
world  is  one  wide  riddle  to  them,  darker  and  darker  as  it 
draws  to  a  close  ;  but  the  secret  of  it  is  known  to  the  child, 
and  the  Lord  of  heaven  and  earth  is  most  to  be  thanked  in 


WORK 


43 


that  1  He  has  hidden  these  things  from  the  wise  and  prudent, 
and  has  revealed  them  unto  babes/  Yes,  and  there  is  death 
— infinitude  of  death  in  the  principalities  and  powers  of  men. 
As  far  as  the  east  is  from  the  west,  so  far  our  sins  are — not 
set  from  us,  but  multiplied  around  us :  the  San  himself, 
think  you  he  now  'rejoices'  to  run  his  course,  when  he 
plunges  westward  to  the  horizon,  so  widely  red,  not  with 
clouds,  but  blood?  And  it  will  be  red  more  widely  yet 
Whatever  drought  of  the  early  and  latter  rain  may  be,  there 
will  be  none  of  that  red  rain.  You  fortify  yourselves,  you 
arm  yourselves  against  it  in  vain  ;  the  enemy  and  avenger 
will  be  upon  you  also,  unless  you  learn  that  it  is  not  out  of  the 
mouths  of  the  knitted  gun,  or  the  smoothed  rifle,  but  £  out  of 
the  mouths  of  babes  and  sucklings '  that  the  strength  is  or- 
dained, which  shall  '  still  the  enemy  and  avenger.' 


LECTURE  XX. 


TRAFFIC. 

(Delivered  in  the  Town  Hally  Bradford.) 

My  good  Yorkshire  friends,  you  asked  me  down  here  among 
your  hills  that  I  might  talk  to  you  about  this  Exchange  you 
are  going  to  build  :  but  earnestly  and  seriously  asking  you  to 
pardon  me,  I  am  going  to  do  nothing  of  the  kind.  I  cannot 
talk,  or  at  least  can  say  very  little,  about;  this  same  Exchange. 
I  must  talk  of  quite  other  things,  though  not  willingly  ; — I 
could  not  deserve  your  pardon,  if  when  you  invited  me  to 
speak  on  one  subject,  I  wilfully  spoke  on  another.  But  I 
cannot  speak,  to  purpose,  of  anything  about  which  I  do  not 
care  ;  and  most  simply  and  sorrowfully  I  have  to  tell  you,  in 
the  outset,  that  I  do  not  care  about  this  Exchange  of  yours. 

If,  however,  when  you  sent  me  your  invitation,  I  had  an- 
swered, '  I  won't  come,  I  don't  care  about  the  Exchange  of 
Bradford,'  you  would  have  been  justly  offended  with  me,  not 
knowing  the  reasons  of  so  blunt  a  carelessness.  So  I  have 
come  down,  hoping  that  you  will  patiently  let  me  tell  you 
why,  on  this,  and  many  other  such  occasions,  I  now  remain 
silent,  when  formerly  I  should  have  caught  at  the  opportunity 
of  speaking  to  a  gracious  audience. 

In  a  word,  then,  I  do  not  care  about  this  Exchange, — be- 
cause you  don't ;  and  because  you  know  perfectly  well  I  can- 
not make  you.  Look  at  the  essential  circumstances  of  the 
case,  which  you,  as  business  men,  know  perfectly  well,  though 
perhaps  you  think  I  forget  them.  You  are  going  to  spend 
30,000Z.,  which  to  you,  collectively,  is  nothing  ;  the  buying  a 
new  coat  is,  as  to  the  cost  of  it,  a  much  more  important 
matter  of  consideration  to  me  than  building  a  new  Exchange 


TRAFFIC. 


45 


is  to  you.  But  you  think  you  may  as  well  have  the  right 
thing  for  your  money.  You  know  there  are  a  great  many 
odd  styles  of  architecture  about ;  you  don't  want  to  do  any- 
thing ridiculous  ;  you  hear  of  me,  among  others,  as  a  respect- 
able architectural  man-milliner  :  and  you  send  for  me,  that  I 
may  tell  you  the  leading  fashion  ;  and  what  is,  in  our  shops, 
for  the  moment,  the  newest  and  sweetest  thing  in  pinnacles. 

Now,  pardon  me  for  telling  you  frankly,  you  cannot  have 
good  architecture  merely  by  asking  people's  advice  on  occa- 
sion. Ail  good  architecture  is  the  expression  of  national  life 
and  character ;  and  it  is  produced  by  a  prevalent  and  eager 
national  taste,  or  desire  for  beauty.  And  I  want  you  to  think 
a  little  of  the  deep  significance  of  this  word  '  taste  ; '  for  no 
statement  of  mine  has  been  more  earnestly  or  oftener  contro- 
verted than  that  good  taste  is  essentially  a  moral  quality. 
'  No/  say  many  of  my  antagonists,  *  taste  is  one  thing,  moral- 
ity is  another.  Tell  us  what  is  pretty  ;  we  shall  be  glad  to 
know  that  ;  but  preach  no  sermons  to  us.' 

Permit  me,  therefore,  to  fortify  this  old  dogma  of  mine 
somewhat.  Taste  is  not  only  a  part  and  an  index  of  morality 
— it  is  the  only  morality.  The  first,  and  last,  and  closest  trial 
question  to  any  living  creature  is,  '  What  do  you  like  ? '  Tell 
me  what  you  like,  and  I'll  tell  you  what  you  are.  Go  out 
into  the  street,  and  ask  the  first  man  or  woman  you  meet, 
what  their  '  taste 9  is,  and  if  they  answer  candidly,  you  know 
them,  body  and  soul.  £  You,  my  friend  in  the  rags,  with  the 
unsteady  gait,  what  do  you  like  ? '  '  A  pipe  and  a  quartern  of 
gin.'  I  know  you.  'You,  good  woman,  with  the  quick  step 
and  tidy  bonnet,  what  do  you  like?'  £A  swept  hearth  and 
a  clean  tea-table,  and  my  husband  opposite  me,  and  a  baby 
at  my  breast.'  Good,  I  know  you  also.  6  You,  little  girl  with 
the  golden  hair  and  the  soft  eyes,  what  do  you  like  ? '  '  My 
canary,  and  a  run  among  the  wood  hyacinths.'  c  You,  little 
boy  with  the  dirty  hands  and  the  low  forehead,  what  do  you 
like  V  '  A  shy  at  the  sparrows,  and  a  game  at  pitch-farthing.' 
Good  ;  we  know  them  all  now.    What  more  need  we  ask  ? 

'Nay,'  perhaps  you  answer  :  '  we  need  rather  to  ask  what 
these  people  and  children  do,  than  wThat  they  like.    If  they  do 


46 


THE  CROWN  OF  WILD  OLIVE. 


right,  it  is  no  matter  that  they  like  what  is  wrong  ;  and  ii 
they  do  wrong,  it  is  no  matter  that  they  like  what  is  right. 
Doing  is  the  great  thing  ;  and  it  does  not  matter  that  the 
man  likes  drinking,  so  that  he  does  not  drink  ;  nor  that  the 
little  girl  likes  to  be  kind  to  her  canary,  if  she  will  not  learn 
her  lessons  ;  nor  that  the  little  boy  likes  throwing  stones  at 
the  sparrows,  if  he  goes  to  the  Sunday  school.'  Indeed,  for 
a  short  time,  and  in  a  provisional  sense,  this  is  true.  For  if, 
resolutely,  people  do  what  is  right,  in  time  they  come  to  like 
doing  it.  But  they  only  are  in  a  right  moral  state  when  they 
have  come  to  like  doing  it ;  and  as  long  as  they  don't  like  it, 
they  are  still  in  a  vicious  state.  The  man  is  not  in  health  of 
body  who  is  always  thirsting  for  the  bottle  in  the  cupboard, 
though  he  bravely  bears  his  thirst ;  but  the  man  who  heartily 
enjoys  water  in  the  morning  and  wine  in  the  evening,  each 
in  its  proper  quantity  and  time.  And  the  entire  object  of 
true  education  is  to  make  people  not  merely  do  the  right 
things,  but  enjoy  the  right  things — not  merely  industrious, 
but  to  love  industry — not  merely  learned,  but  to  love* know- 
ledge— not  merely  pure,  but  to  love  purity — not  merely  just, 
but  to  hunger  and  thirst  after  justice. 

But  you  may  answer  or  think,  '  Is  the  liking  for  outside 
ornaments, — for  pictures,  or  statues,  or  furniture,  or  archi- 
tecture,— a  moral  quality?'  Yes,  most  surely,  if  a  rightly 
set  liking.  Taste  for  any  pictures  or  statues  is  not  a  moral 
quality,  but  taste  for  good  ones  is.  Only  here  again  we  have 
to  define  the  word  -  good.'  I  don't  mean  by  'good/  clever 
— or  learned — or  difficult  in  the  doing.  Take  a  picture  by 
Teniers,  of  sots  quarrelling  over  their  dice  :  it  is  an  entirely 
clever  picture  ;  so  clever  that  nothing  in  its  kind  has  ever 
been  done  equal  to  it ;  but  it  is  also  an  entirely  base  and  evil 
picture.  It  is  an  expression  of  delight  in  the  prolonged  con- 
templation of  a  vile  thing,  and  delight  in  that  is  an  '  unman- 
nered,'  or  6  immoral '  quality.  It  is  '  bad  taste  '  in  the  pro- 
foundest  sense — it  is  the  taste  of  the  devils.  On  the  other 
hand,  a  picture  of  Titian's,  or  a  Greek  statue,  or  a  Greek 
coin,  or  a  Turner  landscape,  expresses  delight  in  the  per- 
petual contemplation  of  a  good  and  perfect  thing.    That  ia 


TRAFFIC. 


47 


an  entirely  moral  quality — it  is  the  taste  of  the  angels.  Anc! 
all  delight  in  art,  and  all  love  of  it,  resolve  themselves  into 
simple  love  of  that  which  deserves  love.  That  deserving  is 
the  quality  which  we  call  '  loveliness  '—(we  ought  to  have  an 
opposite  word,  hateliness,  to  be  said  of  the  things  which  de- 
serve to  be  hated)  ;  and  it  is  not  an  indifferent  nor  optional 
thing  whether  we  love  this  or  that ;  but  it  is  just  the  vital 
function  of  all  our  being.  What  we  like  determines  what  we 
are,  and  is  the  sign  of  what  we  are ;  and  to  teach  taste  is  in- 
evitably to  form  character.  As  I  was  thinking  over  this,  in 
walking  up  Fleet  Street  the  other  day,  my  eye  caught  the  title 
of  a  book  standing  open  in  a  bookseller's  window.  It  was — 
■  On  the  necessity  of  the  diffusion  of  taste  among  all  classes.' 
L  Ah/  I  thought  to  myself,  'my  classifying  friend,  when  you 
have  diffused  your  taste,  where  will  your  classes  be  ?  The 
man  who  likes  what  you  like,  belongs  to  the  same  class  with 
you,  I  think.  Inevitably  so.  You  may  put  him  to  other 
work  if  you  choose  ;  but,  by  the  condition  you  have  brought 
him  into,  he  will  dislike  the  other  work  as  much  as  you  would 
yourself.  You  get  hold  of  a  scavenger,  or  a  costermonger, 
who  enjoyed  the  Newgate  Calendar  for  literature,  and  "Pop 
goes  the  Weasel "  for  music.  You  think  you  can  make  him 
like  Dante  and  Beethoven  ?  I  wish  you  joy  of  your  lessons  ; 
but  if  you  do,  you  have  made  a  gentleman  of  him  : — he  won't 
like  to  go  back  to  his  costermongering.' 

And  so  completely  and  unexceptionally  is  this  so,  that,  if 
I  had  time  to-night,  I  could  show  you  that  a  nation  cannot  be 
affected  by  any  vice,  or  weakness,  without  expressing  it,  legi- 
bly, and  for  ever,  either  in  bad  art,  or  by  want  of  art ;  and 
that  there  is  no  national  virtue,  small  or  great,  which  is  not 
manifestly  expressed  in  all  the  art  which  circumstances  en- 
able the  people  possessing  that  virtue  to  produce.  Take,  for 
instance,  your  great  English  virtue  of  enduring  and  patient 
Eourage.  You  have  at  present  in  England  only  one  art  of 
any  consequence — that  is,  iron-working.  You  know  thor- 
oughly well  how  to  cast  and  hammer  iron.  Now,  do  you 
think  in  those  masses  of  lava  which  you  build  volcanic  cones 
to  melt,  and  which  you  forge  at  the  mouths  of  the  Infernos 


43 


THE  CROWN  OF  WILD  OLIVE. 


you  liavo  created  ;  do  you  think,  on  those  iron  plates,  youi 
courage  and  endurance  are  not  written  for  ever — not  merely 
with  an  iron  pen,  but  on  iron  parchment  ?  And  take  also 
your  great  English  vice — European  vice — vice  of  all  the  world 
— vice  of  all  other  worlds  that  roll  or  shine  in  heaven,  bearing 
with  them  yet  the  atmosphere  of  hell — the  vice  of  jealousy, 
which  brings  competition  into  your  commerce,  treachery  into 
your  councils,  and  dishonour  into  your  wars — that  vice  which 
has  rendered  for  you,  and  for  your  next  neighbouring  nation, 
the  daily  occupations  of  existence  no  longer  possible,  but 
with  the  mail  upon  your  breasts  and  the  sword  loose  in  its 
sheath  ;  so  that,  at  last,  you  have  realised  for  all  the  multi- 
tudes of  the  two  great  peoples  who  lead  the  so-called  civilisa- 
tion of  the  earth, — you  have  realised  for  them  all,  I  say,  in 
person  and  in  policy,  what  was  once  true  only  of  the  rough 
Border  riders  of  your  Cheviot  hills — 

*  They  carved  at  the  meal 
With  gloves  of  steel, 
And  they  drank  the  red  wine  through  the  helmet  barr'd ; — 

do  you  think  that  this  national  shame  and  dastardliness  of 
heart  are  not  written  as  legibly  on  every  rivet  of  your  iron 
armour  as  the  strength  of  the  right  hands  that  forged  it  ? 
Friends,  I  know  not  whether  this  thing  be  the  more  ludicrous 
or  the  more  melancholy.  It  is  quite  unspeakably  both.  Sup- 
pose, instead  of  being  now  sent  for  by  you,  I  had  been  sent 
for  by  some  private  gentleman,  living  in  a  suburban  house, 
with  his  garden  separated  only  by  a  fruit-wall  from  his  next 
door  neighbour's  ;  and  he  had  called  me  to  consult  with  him 
on  the  furnishing  of  his  drawing  room.  I  begin  looking 
about  me,  and  find  the  walls  rather  bare  ;  I  think  such  and 
such  a  paper  might  be  desirable — perhaps  a  little  fresco  here 
and  there  on  the  ceiling — a  damask  curtain  or  so  at  the  win- 
dows. c Ah/ says  my  employer,  'damask  curtains,  indeed! 
That's  all  very  fine,  but  you  know  I  can't  afford  that  kind  of 
thing  just  now ! '  '  Yet  the  world  credits  you  with  a  splendid 
income  ! '    '  Ah,  yes/  says  my  friend,  '  but  do  you  know,  at 


TRAFFIC. 


49 


present,  I  am  obliged  to  spend  it  nearly  all  in  steel-traps?1 
*  Steel-traps  !  for  whom  ?  ■  '  Why,  for  that  fellow  on  the 
other  side  the  wall,  you  know  :  we're  very  good  friends,  capi- 
tal friends ;  but  we  are  obliged  to  keep  our  traps  set  on  both 
sides  of  the  wall  ;  we  could  not  possibly  keep  on  friendly 
terms  without  them,  and  our  spring  guns.  The  worst  of  it 
is,  we  are  both  clever  fellows  enough  ;  and  there's  never  a  day 
passes  that  we  don't  find  out  a  new  trap,  or  a  new  gun-bar- 
rel, or  something  ;  we  spend  about  fifteen  millions  a  year  each 
in  our  traps,  take  it  all  together ;  and  I  don't  see  how  we're  to 
do  with  less.'  A  highly  comic  state  of  life  for  two  private 
gentlemen  !  but  for  two  nations,  it  seems  to  me,  not  wholly 
comic  ?  Bedlam  would  be  comic,  perhaps,  if  there  were  only 
*!me  madman  in  it ;  and  your  Christmas  pantomime  is  comic, 
^hen  there  is  only  one  clown  in  it ;  but  when  the  whole 
Rrorld  turns  clown,  and  paints  itself  red  with  its  own  heart's 
Dlood  instead  of  vermilion,  it  is  something  else  than  comic, 
>  think. 

Mind,  I  know  a  great  deal  of  this  is  play,  and  willingly  al- 
low for  that.  You  don't  know  what  to  do  with  yourselves  for 
a  sensation  :  fox-hunting  and  cricketing  will  not  carry  you 
through  the  whole  of  this  unendurably  long  mortal  life  :  you 
J  iked  pop-guns  when  you  were  schoolboys,  and  rifles  and 
Armstrongs  are  only  the  same  things  better  made  :  but  then 
the  worst  of  it  is,  that  what  was  play  to  you  when  boys,  was 
not  play  to  the  sparrows  ;  and  what  is  play  to  you  now,  is  not 
play  to  the  small  birds  of  State  neither  ;  and  for  the  black 
eagles,  you  are  somewhat  shy  of  taking  shots  at  them,  if  I 
mistake  not. 

I  must  get  back  to  the  matter  in  hand,  however.  Believe 
me,  without  farther  instance,  I  could  show  you,  in  all  time, 
that  every  nation's  vice,  or  virtue,  was  written  in  its  art :  the 
soldiership  of  early  Greece  ;  the  sensuality  of  late  Italy  ;  the 
visionary  religion  of  Tuscany  ;  the  splendid  human  energy 
and  beauty  of  Venice.  I  have  no  time  to  do  this  to-night  (I 
have  done  it  elsewhere  before  now) ;  but  I  proceed  to  apply 
the  principle  to  ourselves  in  a  more  searching  manner. 

I  notice  that  among  all  the  new  buildings  *hat  cover  your 
4 


50 


THE  CROWJV  OF  WILD  OLIVE. 


once  wild  hills,  churches  and  schools  are  mixed  in  due,  that 
is  to  say,  in  large  proportion,  with  your  mills  and  mansions 
and  I  notice  also  that  the  churches  and  schools  are  almost 
always  Gothic,  and  the  mansions  and  mills  are  never  Gothic. 
Will  you  allow  me  to  ask  precisely  the  meaning  of  this  ?  For9 
remember,  it  is  peculiarly  a  modern  phenomenon.  When 
Gothic  was  invented,  houses  were  Gothic  as  well  as  churches  •, 
and  when  the  Italian  style  superseded  the  Gothic,  churches 
were  Italian  as  well  as  houses.  If  there  is  a  Gothic  spire 
to  the  cathedral  of  Antwerp,  there  is  a  Gothic  belfry  to  the 
Hotel  de  Ville  at  Brussels  ;  if  Inigo  Jones  builds  an  Italian 
Whitehall,  Sir  Christopher  W ren  builds  an  Italian  St.  Paul's. 
But  now  you  live  under  one  school  of  architecture,  and  wor- 
ship under  another.  What  do  you  mean  by  doing  this  ?  Am 
I  to  understand  that  you  are  thinking  of  changing  your  archi- 
tecture back  to  Gothic  ;  and  that  you  treat  your  churches  ex- 
perimentally, because  it  does  not  matter  wThat  mistakes  you 
make  in  a  church?  Or  am  I  to  understand  that  you  con- 
sider Gothic  a  pre-eminently  sacred  and  beautiful  mode  of 
building,  which  you  think,  like  the  fine  frankincense,  should 
be  mixed  for  the  tabernacle  only,  and  reserved  for  your  reli- 
gious services?  For  if  this  be  the  feeling,  though  it  may 
seem  at  first  as  if  it  were  graceful  and  reverent,  you  will  find 
that,  at  the  root  of  the  matter,  it  signifies  neither  more  nor 
less  than  that  you  have  separated  your  religion  from  your 
life. 

For  consider  what  a  wide  significance  this  fact  has  ;  and  re* 
meinber  that  it  is  not  you  only,  but  all  the  people  of  England, 
who  are  behaving  thus  just  now. 

You  have  all  got  into  the  habit  of  calling  the  church  '  the 
house  of  God.'  I  have  seen,  over  the  doors  of  many  churches, 
the  legend  actually  carved,  '  This  is  the  house  of  God,  and 
this  is  the  gate  of  heaven.'  Nov/,  note  where  that  legend 
comes  from,  and  of  what  place  it  was  first  spoken.  A  boy 
ieaves  his  fathers  house  to  go  on  a  long  journey  on  foot,  to 
visit  his  uncle  ;  he  has  to  cross  a  wild  hill-desert ;  just  as  if 
one  of  your  own  boys  had  to  cross  the  wo]ds  of  Westmore- 
land, to  visit  an  uncle  at  Carlisle.    The  second  or  third  day 


TRAFFIC. 


51 


your  boy  finds  himself  somewhere  between  Hawes  and 
Brough,  in  the  midst  of  the  moors,  at  sunset.  It  is  stony 
ground,  and  boggy  ;  he  cannot  go  one  foot  farther  that 
night.  Down  he  Hes,  to  sleep,  on  Wharnside,  where  best  he 
may,  gathering  a  few  of  the  stones  together  to  put  under  his 
head  ; — so  wild  the  place  is,  he  cannot  get  anything  but  stones. 
And  there,  lying  under  the  broad  night,  he  has  a  dream  ;  and 
he  sees  a  ladder  set  up  on  the  earth,  and  the  top  of  it  reaches 
to  heaven,  and  the  angels  of  God  are  ascending  and  descend- 
ing upon  it.  And  when  he  wakes  out  of  his  sleep,  he  says, 
'  How  dreadful  is  this  place  ;  surely,  this  is  none  other  than 
the  house  of  God,  and  this  is  the  gate  of  heaven.'  This 
place,  observe  ;  not  this  church  ;  not  this  city  ;  not  this  stone, 
even,  which  he  puts  up  for  a  memorial — the  piece  of  flint  on 
which  his  head  has  lain.  But  this  place  ;  this  windy  slope 
of  Wharnside  ;  this  moorland  hollow,  torrent-bitten,  snow- 
blighted  ;  this  any  place  where  God  lets  down  the  ladder. 
And  how  are  you  to  know  where  that  will  be  ?  or  how  are  you 
to  determine  where  it  may  be,  but  by  being  ready  for  it 
always?  Do  you  know  where  the  lightning  is  to  fall  next? 
You  do  know  that,  partly  ;  you  can  guide  the  lightning  ;  but 
you  cannot  guide  the  going  forth  of  the  Spirit,  which  is  that 
lightning  when  it  shines  from  the  east  to  the  west. 

But  the  perpetual  and  insolent  warping  of  that  strong  verse 
to  serve  a  merely  ecclesiastical  purpose,  is  only  one  of  the 
thousand  instances  in  which  we  sink  back  into  gross  Judaism, 
We  call  our  churches  'temples/  Now,  you  know,  or  ought 
to  know,  they  are  not  temples.  They  have  never  had,  never 
can  have,  anything  whatever  to  do  with  temples.  They  are 
'  synagogues  ' — '  gathering  places  * — where  you  gather  your* 
selves  together  as  an  assembly  ;  and  by  not  calling  them  so, 
you  again  miss  the  force  of  another  mighty  text — '  Thou, 
when  thou  prayest,  shalt  not  be  as  the  hypocrites  are ;  for 
they  love  to  pray  standing  in  the  churches'  [we  should  trans- 
late it],  6  that  they  may  be  seen  of  men.  But  thou,  when  thou 
prayest,  enter  into  thy  closet,  and  when  thou  hast  shut  thy 
door,  pray  to  thy  Father/ — which  is,  not  in  chancel  nor  m 
aisle,  but  4  in  secret.' 


52 


THE  CROWN  OF  WILD  OLIVE. 


New,  you  feel,  as  I  say  tins  to  you — I  know  you  feel — as 
if  I  were  trying  to  take  away  the  honour  of  your  churches. 
Not  so  ;  I  am  trying  to  prove  to  you  the  honour  of  your 
houses  and  your  hills  5  I  am  trying  to  show  you — not  that 
the  Church  is  not  sacred — but  that  the  whole  Earth  is.  I 
would  have  you  feel,  what  careless,  what  constant,  what  in- 
fectious sin  there  is  in  all  modes  of  thought,  whereby,  in 
calling  your  churches  only  '  holy,'  you  call  your  hearths  and 
homes  profane  ;  and  have  separated  yourselves  from  the 
heathen  by  casting  all  your  household  gods  to  the  ground, 
instead  of  recognising,  in  the  place  of  their  many  and  feeble 
Lares,  the  presence  of  your  One  and  Mighty  Lord  and  Lar, 

'  But  what  has  all  this  to  do  with  our  Exchange  ? '  you  ask 
me,  impatiently.  My  dear  friends,  it  has  just  everything  to 
do  with  it ;  on  these  inner  and  great  questions  depend  all  the 
outer  and  little  ones  ;  and  if  you  have  asked  me  down  here 
to  speak  to  you,  because  you  had  before  been  interested  in 
anything  I  have  written,  you  must  know  that  ail  I  have  yet 
said  about  architecture  was  to  show  this.  The  book  I  called 
'The  Seven  Lamps'  was  to  show  that  certain  right  states  of 
temper  and  moral  feeling  were  the  magic  powers  by  which 
all  good  architecture,  without  exception,  had  been  produced. 
'  The  Stones  of  Venice,'  had,  from  beginning  to  end,  no  other 
aim  than  to  show  that  the  Gothic  architecture  of  Venice  had 
arisen  out  of,  and  indicated  in  all  its  features,  a  state  of  pure 
national  faith,  and  of  domestic  virtue  ;  and  that  its  Renais- 
sance architecture  had  arisen  out  of,  and  in  all  its  features  in- 
dicated, a  state  of  concealed  national  infidelity,  and  of  domes- 
tic corruption.  And  now,  you  ask  me  what  style  is  best  to 
build  in  ;  and  how  can  I  answer,  knowing  the  meaning  of  the 
two  styles,  but  by  another  question — do  you  mean  to  build 
as  Christians  or  as  Infidels  ?  And  still  more— do  you  mean 
to  build  as  honest  Christians  or  as  honest  Infidels  ?  as  thor, 
oughly  and  confessedly  either  one  or  the  other  ?  You  don't 
like  to  be  asked  such  rude  questions.  I  cannot  help  it ;  they 
are  of  much  more  importance  than  this  Exchange  business ; 
and  if  they  can  be  at  once  answered,  the  Exchange  business 
settles  itself  in  a  moment.    But,  before  I  press  them  farther, 


TRAFFIC. 


53 


1  must  ask  leave  to  explain  one  point  clearly.  In  all  my  past 
work,  my  endeavour  has  been  to  show  that  good  architecture 
is  essentially  religious — the  production  of  a  faithful  and  vir^ 
tuous,  not  of  an  infidel  and  corrupted  people.  But  in  the 
course  of  doing  this,  I  have  had  also  to  show  that  good  archi- 
tecture is  not  ecclesiastical.  People  are  so  apt  to  look  upon 
religion  as  the  business  of  the  clergy,  not  their  own,  that  the 
moment  they  hear  of  anything  depending  on  'religion,'  they 
think  it  must  also  have  depended  on  the  priesthood  ;  and  1 
have  had  to  -  take  what  place  was  to  be  occupied  between 
these  two  errors,  and  fight  both,  often  with  seeming  contra- 
diction. Good  architecture  is  the  work  of  good  and  believ- 
ing men ;  therefore,  you  say,  at  least  some  people  say,  '  Good 
architecture  must  essentially  have  been  the  work  of  the  cler- 
gy, not  of  the  laity/  No — a  thousand  times  no  ;  good  archi- 
tecture has  always  been  the  work  of  the  commonalty,  not  of 
the  clergy.  What,  you  say,  those  glorious  cathedrals — the 
pride  of  Europe — did  their  builders  not  form  Gothic  archi- 
tecture ?  No  ;  they  corrupted  Gothic  architecture.  Gothic 
was  formed  in  the  baron's  castle,  and  the  burgher's  street. 
It  was  formed  by  the  thoughts,  and  hands,  and  powers  of 
free  citizens  and  soldier  kings.  By  the  monk  it  was  used  as 
an  instrument 'for  the  aid  of  his  superstition  ;  when  that  su- 
perstition became  a  beautiful  madness,  and  the  best  hearts  of 
Europe  vainly  dreamed  and  pined  in  the  cloister,  and  vainly 
raged  and  perished  in  the  crusade — through  that  fury  of  per- 
verted faith  and  wasted  war,  the  Gothic  rose  also  to  its  love- 
liest, most  fantastic,  and,  finally,  most  foolish  dreams ;  and, 
in  those  dreams,  was  lost, 

I  hope,  now,  that  there  is  no  risk  of  your  misunderstanding 
me  when  I  come  to  the  gist  of  what  I  want  to  say  to-night — 
when  I  repeat,  that  every  great  national  architecture  has  been 
the  result  and  exponent  of  a  great  national  religion.  You 
can't  have  bits  of  it  here,  bits  there — you  must  have  it  every- 
where, or  nowhere.  It  is  not  the  monopoly  of  a  clerical  com* 
pany — it  is  not  the  exponent  of  a  theological  dogma — it  is  not 
the  hieroglyphic  writing  of  an  initiated  priesthood  ;  it  is  the 
manly  language  of  a  people  inspired  by  resolute  and  common 


54 


THE  CROWN  OF  WILD  OLIVE. 


purpose,  and  rendering  resolute  and  common  fidelity  to  thfl 
legible  laws  of  an  undoubted  God. 

Now,  there  have  as  yet  been  three  distinct  schools  of  Eu- 
ropean architecture.  I  say,  European,  because  Asiatic  and 
African  architectures  belong  so  entirely  to  other  races  and 
climates,  that  there  is  no  question  of  them  here ;  only,  in  pass- 
ing, I  will  simply  assure  you  that  whatever  is  good  or  great 
in  Egypt,  and  Syria,  and  India,  is  just  good  or  great  for  the 
same  reasons  as  the  buildings  on  our  side  of  the  Bosphorus. 
We  Europeans,  then,  have  had  three  great  religions  :  the 
Greek,  which  was  the  worship  of  the  God  of  Wisdom  and 
Power  ;  the  Mediaeval,  which  was  the  Worship  of  the  God 
of  Judgment  and  Consolation ;  the  Renaissance.,  which  was 
the  worship  of  the  God  of  Pride  and  Beauty  ;  these  three  we 
have  had — they  are  past, — and  now,  at  last,  wre  English  have 
got  a  fourth  religion,  and  a  God  of  our  own,  about  which  I 
want  to  ask  you.  But  I  must  explain  these  three  old  ones 
first. 

I  repeat,  first,  the  Greeks  essentially  worshipped  the  God 
of  Wisdom  ;  so  that  whatever  contended  against  their  reli- 
gion,— -to  the  Jews  a  stumbling  block, — was,  to  the  Greeks — 
Foolishness. 

The  first  Greek  idea  of  Deity  was  that  expressed  in  the 
word,  of  which  we  keep  the  remnant  in  our  words  'Z^-urnal' 
and  '  Di-vine ' — the  god  of  Day,  Jupiter  the  revealer.  Athena 
is  his  .daughter,  but  especially  daughter  of  the  Intellect, 
springing  armed  from  the  head.  We  are  only  with  the  help 
of  recent  investigation  beginning  to  penetrate  the  depth  of 
meaning  couched  under  the  Athenaic  symbols  :  but  I  may 
note  rapidly,  that  her  segis,  the  mantle  with  the  serpent 
fringes,  in  which  she  often,  in  the  best  statues,  is  represented 
as  folding  up  her  left  hand  for  better  guard,  and  the  Gorgon 
on  her  shield,  are  both  representative  mainly  of  the  chilling 
horror  and  sadness  (turning  men  to  stone,  as  it  were,)  of  the 
outmost  and  superficial  spheres  of  knowledge — that  knowl- 
edge which  separates,  in  bitterness,  hardness,  and  sorrow; 
the  heart  of  the  full-grown  man  from  the  heart  of  the  child* 
For  out  of  imperfect  knowledge  spring  terror,  dissension, 


TRAFFIC. 


65 


danger,  and  disdain  ;  but  from  perfect  knowledge,  given  by 
the  full-revealed  Atliena,  strength  and  peace,  in  sign  of  which 
she  is  crowned  with  the  olive  spray,  and  bears  the  resistless 
spear. 

This,  then,  was  the  Greek  conception  of  purest  Deity,  and 
every  habit  of  life,  and  every  form  of  his  art  developed  them- 
selves from  the  seeking  this  bright,  serene,  resistless  wisdom  ; 
and  setting  himself,  as  a  man,  to  do  things  evermore  rightly 
and  strongly  ;  *  not  with  any  ardent  affection  or  ultimate 
hope  ;  but  with  a  resolute  and  continent  energy  of  will,  as 
knowing  that  for  failure  there  was  no  consolation,  and  for  sin 
there  was  no  remission.  And  the  Greek  architecture  rose 
unerring,  bright,  clearly  defined,  and  self-contained. 

Next  followed  in  Europe  the  great  Christian  faith,  which 
was  essentially  the  religion  of  Comfort.  Its  great  doctrine 
is  the  remission  of  sins ;  for  which  cause  it  happens,  too 
often,  in  certain  phases  of  Christianity,  that  sin  and  sickness 
themselves  are  partly  glorified,  as  if,  the  more  you  had  to  be 
healed  of,  the  more  divine  was  the  healing.  The  practical 
result  of  this  doctrine,  in  art,  is  a  continual  contemplation 
of  sin  and  disease,  and  of  imaginary  states  of  purification 
from  them  ;  thus  we  have  an  architecture  conceived  in  a 
mingled  sentiment  of  melancholy  and  aspiration,  partly 
severe,  partly  luxuriant,  which  will  bend  itself  to  every  one 
of  our  needs,  and  every  one  of  our  fancies,  and  be  strong  or 
weak  with  us,  as  we  are  strong  or  weak  ourselves.  It  is,  of 
ail  architecture,  the  basest,  when  base  people  build  it — of  all 
the  noblest,  when  built  by  the  noble. 

And  now  note  that  both  these  religions — Greek  and  Medi- 

*  It  is  an  error  to  suppose  that  the  Greek  worship,  or  seeking,  was 
chiefly  of  Beauty.  It  was  essentially  of  Brightness  and  Strength,  founded 
on  Forethought :  the  principal  character  of  Greek  art  is  not  Beauty,  but 
Design  :  and  the  Dorian  Apollo-worship  and  Athenian  Virgin-worship 
are  both  expressions  of  adoration  of  divine  Wisdom  and  Purity.  Next 
to  these  great  deities  rank,  in  power  over  the  national  mind,  Dionysus 
and  Ceres,  the  givers  of  human  strength  and  life:  then,  for  heroic  ex- 
ample, Hercules.  There  is  no  Venus- worship  among  the  Greek  in  the 
great  times:  and  the  Muses  are  essentially  teachers  of  Truth,  and  of  its 
harmonies. 


THE  CRO  WN  OF  WILD  OLIVft. 


seval — perished  by  falsehood  in  their  own  main  purpose 
The  Greek  religion  of  Wisdom  perished  in  a  false  philosophy 
— £  Oppositions  of  science,  falsely  so  called/  The  Mediaeval 
religion  of  Consolation  perished  in  false  comfort  ;  in  remis- 
sion of  sins  given  lyingly.  It  was  the  selling  of  absolution 
that  ended  the  Mediaeval  faith  ;  and  I  can  tell  you  more,  it  is 
the  selling  of  absolution  which,  to  the  end  of  time,  will  mark 
false  Christianity.  Pure  Christianity  gives  her  remission  of 
sins  only  by  ending  them  ;  but  false  Christianity  gets  her 
remission  of  sins  by  compounding  for  them.  And  there  are 
many  ways  of  compounding  for  them.  We  English  have 
beautiful  little  quiet  ways  of  buying  absolution,  whether  in 
low  Church  or  high,  far  more  cunning  than  any  of  Tetzels 
trading. 

Then,  thirdly,  there  followed  the  religion  of  Pleasure,  in 
which  all  Europe  gave  itself  to  luxury,  ending  in  death. 
First,  bals  masques  in  every  saloon,  and  then  guillotines  in 
every  square.  And  all  these  three  worships  issue  in  vast 
temple  building.  Your  Greek  worshipped  Wisdom,  and 
built  you  the  Parthenon — the  Virgin's  temple.  The  Mediae- 
val worshipped  Consolation,  and  built  you  Virgin  temples 
also. — but  to  our  Lady  of  Salvation.  Then  the  Kevivalist 
worshipped  beauty,  of  a  sort,  and  built  you  Versailles,  and 
the  Vatican.  Now,  lastly,  will  you  tell  me  what  ive  worship, 
and  wrhat  ive  build  ? 

You  know  we  are  speaking  always  of  the  real,  active,  con- 
tinual, national  worship  ;  that  by  which  men  act  while  they 
live  ;  not  that  which  they  talk  of  when  they  die.  Now,  we 
have,  indeed,  a  nominal  religion,  to  which  we  pay  tithes  of 
property,  and  sevenths  of  time  ;  but  we  have  also  a  practical 
and  earnest  religion,  to  which  we  devote  nine-tenths  of  our 
property  and  six-sevenths  of  our  time.  And  we  dispute  a 
great  deal  about  the  nominal  religion  ;  but  we  are  all  unani- 
mous about  this  practical  one,  of  which  I  think  you  will  admit 
that  the  ruling  goddess  may  be  best  generally  described  as 
the  '  Goddess  of  Getting-on,'  or  '  Britannia  of  the  Market.' 
The  Athenians  had  an  'Athena  Agoraia,'  or  Minerva  of  the 
Market ;  but  she  was  a  subordinate  type  of  their  goddess^ 


TRAFFIC. 


57 


while  our  Britannia  Agoraia  is  the  principal  type  of  ours. 
And  all  your  great  architectural  works,  are,  of  course,  built 
to  her.  It  is  long  since  you  built  a  great  cathedral ;  and  how 
you  would  laugh  at  me,  if  I  proposed  building  a  cathedral  on 
the  top  of  one  of  these  hills  of  yours,  taking  it  for  an  Acrop- 
olis !  But  your  railroad  mounds,  prolonged  masses  of  Acrop- 
olis ;  your  railroad  stations,  vaster  than  the  Parthenon,  and 
innumerable  ;  your  chimneys,  how  much  more  mighty  and 
costly  than  cathedral  spires  !  your  harbour-piers  ;  your  ware- 
houses ;  your  exchanges ! — all  these  are  built  to  your  great 
Goddess  of  6  Getting-on  ; '  and  she  has  formed,  and  will  con- 
tinue to  form,  your  architecture,  as  long  as  you  worship  her  ; 
and  it  is  quite  vain  to  ask  me  to  tell  you  how  to  build  to  her; 
you  know  far  better  than  I. 

There  might  indeed,  on  some  theories,  be  a  conceivably 
good  architecture  for  Exchanges — that  is  to  say  if  there  were 
any  heroism  in  the  fact  or  deed  of  exchange,  which  might  be 
typically  carved  on  the  outside  of  your  building.  For,  you 
know,  all  beautiful  architecture  must  be  adorned  with  sculp- 
ture or  painting  ;  and  for  sculpture  or  painting,  you  must 
have  a  subject.  And  hitherto  it  has  been  a  received  opinion 
among  the  nations  of  the  world  that  the  only  right  subjects 
for  either,  were  heroisms  of  some  sort.  Even  on  his  pots  and 
his  flagons,  the  Greek  put  a  Hercules  slaying  lions,  or  an 
Apollo  slaying  serpents,  or  Bacchus  slaying  melancholy 
giants,  and  earth-born  despondencies.  On  his  temples,  the 
Greek  put  contests  of  great  warriors  in  founding  states,  or  of 
gods  with  evil  spirits.  On  his  houses  and  temples  alike,  the 
Christian  put  carvings  of  angels  conquering  devils  ;  or  of 
hero-martyrs  exchanging  this  world  for  another ;  subject  in- 
appropriate, I  think,  to  our  manner  of  exchange  here.  And 
the  Master  of  Christians  not  only  left  his  followers  without 
any  orders  as  to  the  sculpture  of  affairs  of  exchange  on  the 
outside  of  buildings,  but  gave  some  strong  evidence  of  his 
dislike  of  affairs  of  exchange  within  them.  And  yet  there 
might  surely  be  a  heroism  in  such  affairs  ;  and  all  commerce 
become  a  kind  of  selling  of  doves,  not  impious.  The  wonder 
has  always  been  great  to  me,  that  heroism  has  never  been 


S8 


THE  CROWN  OF  WILD  OLIVE. 


supposed  to  be  in  anywise  consistent  with  the  practice  oi 
supplying  people  with  food,  or  clothes  ;  but  rather  with  that 
of  quartering  oneself  upon  them  for  food,  and  stripping  them 
of  their  clothes.    Spoiling  of  armour  is  an  heroic  deed  in  all 
ages  ;  but  the  selling  of  clothes,  old,  or  new,  has  never  taken 
any  colour  of  magnanimity.    Yet  one  does  not  see  why  feed- 
ing the  hungry  and  clothing  the  naked  should  ever  become 
base  businesses,  even  when  engaged  in  on  a  large  scale.  If 
one  could  contrive  to  attach  the  notion  of  conquest  to  them 
anyhow?  so  that,  supposing  there  were  anywhere  an  obstinate 
race,  who  refused  to  be  comforted,  one  might  take  some 
pride  in  giving  them  compulsory  comfort  ;  and  as  it  were, 
6  occupying  a  country  ■  with  one's  gifts,  instead  of  one's 
armies  ?    If  one  could  only  consider  it  as  much  a  victory  to 
get  a  barren  field  sown,  as  to  get  an  eared  field  stripped  ;  and 
contend  who  should  build  villages,  instead  of  who  should 
'  carry'  them.    Are  not  all  forms  of  heroism,  conceivable  in 
doing  these  serviceable  deeds  ?    You  doubt  who  is  strongest  ? 
It  might  be  ascertained  by  push  of  spade,  as  well  as  push  of 
sword.     Who  is  wisest  ?     There  are  witty  things  to  be 
thought  of  in  planning  other  business  than  campaigns.  Who 
is  bravest?    There  are  always  the  elements  to  fight  with, 
stronger  than  men  ;  and  nearly  as  merciless.    The  only  ab- 
solutely and  unapproachably  heroic  element  in  the  soldier's 
work  seems  to  be — that  he  is  paid  little  for  it — and  regularly : 
while  you  traffickers,  and  exchangers,  and  others  occupied  in 
presumably  benevolent  business,  like  to  be  paid  much  for  it 
—and  by  chance.    I  never  can  make  out  how  it  is  that  a 
knight-errant  does  not  expect  to  be  paid  for  his  trouble,  but  a 
pedlar-errant  always  does  ;— that  people  are  willing  to  take 
hard  knocks  for  nothing,  but  never  to  sell  ribands  cheap  ;— 
that  they  are  ready  to  go  on  fervent  crusades  to  recover  the 
tomb  of  a  buried  God,  never  on  any  travels  to  fulfil  the 
orders  of  a  living  God  ;— that  they  will  go  anywhere  barefoot 
to  preach  their  faith,  but  must  be  well  bribed  to  practise  it, 
and  are  perfectly  ready  to  give  the  Gospel  gratis,  but  never 
the  loaves  and  fishes.    If  you  chose  to  take  the  matter  up  on 
any  such  soldierly  principle,  to  do  your  commerce,  and  you* 


TRAFFIC. 


59 


feeding  of  nations,  for  fixed  salaries  ;  and  to  be  as  particular* 
about  giving  people  the  best  food,  and  the  best  cloth,  as  sol* 
diers  are  about  giving  them  the  best  gunpowder,  I  could 
carve  something  for  you  on  your  exchange  worth  looking  at. 
But  I  can  only  at  present  suggest  decorating  its  frieze  with 
pendant  purses  ;  and  making  its  pillars  broad  at  the  base  for 
the  sticking  of  bills.  And  in  the  innermost  chambers  of  it 
there  might  be  a  statue  of  Britannia  of  the  Market,  who  may 
have,  perhaps  advisably,  a  partridge  for  her  crest,  typical  at 
once  of  her  courage  in  fighting  for  noble  ideas  ;  and  of  her 
interest  in  game  ;  and  round  its  neck  the  inscription  in  golden 
letters,  'Perdix  fovit  qune  non  peperit.' *  Then,  for  her 
spear,  she  might  have  a  weaver's  beam  :  and  on  her  shield, 
instead  of  her  Cross,  the  Milanese  boar,  semi-fleeced,  with 
the  town  of  Gennesaret  proper,  in  the  field  and  the  legend 
'In  the  best  market,'  and  her  corslet,  of  leather,  folded  over 
her  heart  in  the  shape  of  a  purse,  with  thirty  slits  in  it  for  a 
piece  of  money  to  go  in  at,  on  each  day  of  the  month.  And 
I  doubt  not  but  that  people  would  come  to  see  your  ex- 
change, and  its  goddess,  with  applause. 

Nevertheless,  I  want  to  point  out  to  you  certain  strange 
characters  in  this  goddess  of  yours.  She  differs  from  the 
great  Greek  and  Mediaeval  deities  essentially  in  two  things — 
first,  as  to  the  continuance  of  her  presumed  power ;  secondly, 
as  to  the  extent  of  it. 

1st,  as  to  the  Continuance. 

The  Greek  Goddess  of  "Wisdom  gave  continual  increase  of 
wisdom,  as  the  Christian  Spirit  of  Comfort  (or  Comforter) 
continual  increase  of  comfort.  There  was  no  question,  with 
these,  of  any  limit  or  cessation  of  function.  But  with  your 
Agora  Goddess,  that  is  just  the  most  important  question. 
Getting  on — but  where  to?  Gathering  together — but  how 
much?  Do  you  mean  to  gather  always — never  to  spend? 
If  so,  I  wish  you  joy  of  your  goddess,  for  I  am  just  as  well 

*  Jerem.  xvii.  11  (best  in  Septuagint  and  Vulgate).  4  As  the  partridge, 
fostering  what  she  brought  not  forth,  so  he  that  getteth  riches,  not  by 
right  shall  leave  theiu  in  the  midst  of  his  days,  and  at  his  end  shall  ha 
a  fool.' 


60 


THE  GROWN  OF  WILD  OLIVE. 


off  as  you,  without  the  trouble  of  worshipping  her  at  alL 
But  if  you  do  not  spend,  somebody  else  will — somebody  else 
must.  And  it  is  because  of  this  (among  many  other  such 
errors)  that  I  have  fearlessly  declared  your  so-called  science 
of  Political  Economy  to  be  no  science  ;  because,  namely,  it 
has  omitted  the  study  of  exactly  the  most  important  branch 
of  the  business — the  study  of  spending.  For  spend  you  must, 
and  as  much  as  you  make,  ultimately.  You  gather  corn  : — • 
will  you  bury  England  under  a  heap  of  grain  ;  or  will  you, 
when  you  have  gathered,  finally  eat  ?  You  gather  gold  : — will 
you  make  your  house-roofs  of  it,  or  pave  your  streets  with 
it  ?  That  is  still  one  way  of  spending  it.  But  if  you  keep 
it,  that  you  may  get  more,  I'll  give  you  more ;  I'll  give  you 
all  the  gold  you  want — all  you  can  imagine — if  you  can  tell 
me  what  you'll  do  with  it.  You  shall  have  thousands  of  gold 
pieces  ; — thousands  of  thousands — millions — mountains,  of 
gold  :  where  will  you  keep  them  ?  Will  you  put  an  Olympus 
of  silver  upon  a  golden  Pelion — make  Ossa  like  a  wart  ?  Do 
you  think  the  rain  and  dew  would  then  come  down  to  you,  in 
the  streams  from  such  mountains,  more  blessedly  than  they 
will  down  the  mountains  which  God  has  made  for  you,  of 
moss  and  whins  tone  ?  But  it  is  not  gold  that  you  want  to 
gather !  What  is  it  ?  greenbacks  ?  No  ;  not  those  neither. 
What  is  it  then — is  it  ciphers  after  a  capital  I  ?  Cannot  you 
practise  writing  ciphers,  and  write  as  many  as  you  want? 
Write  ciphers  for  an  hour  every  morning,  in  a  big  book,  and 
say  every  evening,  I  am  worth  all  those  noughts  more  than  I 
was  yesterday.  Won't  that  do  ?  Weil,  what  in  the  name  of 
Plutus  is  it  you  want  ?  Not  gold,  not  greenbacks,  not  ciphers 
after  a  capital  I  ?  You  will  have  to  answer,  after  all,  '  No ; 
we  want,  somehow  or  other,  money's  worth.'  Well,  what  is 
that  ?  Let  your  Goddess  of  Getting-on  discover  it,  and  let 
her  learn  to  stay  therein. 

II.  But  there  is  yet  another  question  to  be  asked  respecting 
this  Goddess  of  Getting-on.  The  first  was  of  the  continuance 
of  her  power  ;  the  second  is  of  its  extent. 

Pallas  and  the  Madonna  were  supposed  to  be  all  the  world's 
pallas,  and  all  the  world's  Madonna.    They  could  teach  all 


TRAFFIC. 


61 


men,  and  they  could  comfort  all  men.  But,  look  strictly  into 
the  nature  of  the  power  of  your  Goddess  of  Getting-on  ;  and 
you  will  find  she  is  the  Goddess — not  of  everybody's  getting 
on — but  only  of  somebody's  getting  on.  This  is  a  vital,  or 
rather  deathful,  distinction.  Examine  it  in  your  own  ideal  of 
the  state  of  national  life  which  this  Goddess  is  to  evoke  and 
maintain.  I  asked  you  what  it  was,  when  I  was  last  here  ;  * — 
you  have  never  told  me.    Now,  shall  I  try  to  tell  you  ? 

Your  ideal  of  human  life  then  is,  I  think,  that  it  should  be 
passed  in  a  pleasant  undulating  world,  with  iron  and  coal 
everywhere  underneath  it.  On  each  pleasant  bank  of  this 
world  is  to  be  a  beautiful  mansion,  with  two  wings  ;  and 
stables,  and  coach-houses ;  a  moderately  sized  park  ;  a  large 
garden  and  hot  houses ;  and  pleasant  carriage  drives  through 
the  shrubberies.  In  this  mansion  are  to  live  the  favoured 
votaries  of  the  Goddess  ;  the  English  gentleman,  with  his 
gracious  wife,  and  his  beautiful  family ;  always  able  to  have 
the  boudoir  and  the  jewels  for  the  wife,  and  the  beautiful 
ball  dresses  for  the  daughters,  and  hunters  for  the  sons,  and 
a  shooting  in  the  Highlands  for  himself.  At  the  bottom  of 
the  bank,  is  to  be  the  mill ;  not  less  than  a  quarter  of  a  mile 
long,  with  a  steam  engine  at  each  end,  and  two  in  the  middle, 
and  a  chimney  three  hundred  feet  high.  In  this  mill  are  to 
be  in  constant  employment  from  eight  hundred  to  a  thousand 
workers,  who  never  drink,  never  strike,  always  go  to  church 
on  Sunday,  and  always  express  themselves  in  respectful  lan- 
guage. 

Is  not  that,  broadly,  and  in  the  main  features,  the  kind  of 
thing  you  propose  to  yourselves  ?  It  is  very  pretty  indeed 
seen  from  above  ;  not  at  all  so  pretfcy,  seen  from  below.  For, 
observe,  while  to  one  family  this  deity  is  indeed  the  Goddess 
of  Getting  on,  to  a  thousand '  families  she  is  the  Goddess  of 
not  Getting  on.  ?  Nay,'  you  say,  6  they  have  all  their  chance.' 
Yes,  so  has  every  one  in  a  lottery,  but  there  must  always  be 
the  same  number  of  blanks.  '  Ah  !  but  in  a  lottery  it  is  not 
skill  and  intelligence  which  take  the  lead,  but  blind  chance, ' 
What  then  !  do  you  think  the  old  practice,  that  '  they  should 
*  Two  Paths,  p.  98. 


62 


TL.E  CROWN  OF  WILD  OLIVE. 


take  who  have  the  power,  and  they  should  keep  who  can/  is 
less  iniquitous,  when  the  power  has  become  power  of  brains 
instead  of  fist  ?  and  that,  though  we  may  not  take  advantage 
of  a  child's  or  a  woman's  weakness,  we  may  of  a  man's  fool- 
ishness? 'Nay,  but  finally,  work  must  be  done,  and  some 
one  must  be  at  the  top,  some  one  at  the  bottom.'  Granted, 
my  friends.  Work  must  always  be,  and  captains  of  work 
must  always  be  ;  and  if  you  in  the  least  remember  the  tone 
of  any  of  my  writings,  you  must  know  that  they  are  thought 
unfit  for  this  age,  because  they  are  always  insisting  on  need 
of  government,  and  speaking  with  scorn  of  liberty.  But  I 
beg  you  to  observe  that  there  is  a  wide  difference  between 
being  captains  or  governors  of  work,  and  taking  the  profits  of 
it.  It  does  not  follow,  because  you  are  general  of  an  army, 
that  you  are  to  take  all  the  treasure,  or  land,  it  wins  (if  it 
fight  for  treasure  or  land) ;  neither,  because  you  are  king  of  a 
nation,  that  you  are  to  consume  all  the  profits  of  the  nation's 
work.  Real  kings,  on  the  contrary,  are  known  invariably  by 
their  doing  quite  the  reverse  of  this, — by  their  taking  the 
least  possible  quantity  of  the  nation's  work  for  themselves. 
There  is  no  test  of  real  kinghood  so  infallible  as  that.  Does 
the  crowned  creature  live  simply,  bravely,  unostentatiously? 
probably  he  is  a  King.  Does  he  cover  his  body  with  jewels, 
and  his  table  with  delicates  ?  in  all  probability  he  is  not  a 
King.  It  is  possible  he  may  be,  as  Solomon  was ;  but  that  is 
when  the  nation  shares  his  splendour  with  him.  Solomon 
made  gold,  not  only  to  be  in  his  own  palace  as  stones,  but  to 
be  in  Jerusalem  as  stones.  But  even  so,  for  the  most  part, 
these  splendid  kinghoods  expire  in  ruin,  and  only  the  true 
kinghoods  live,  which  are  of  royal  labourers  governing  loyal 
labourers  ;  who,  both  leading  rough  lives,  establish  the  true 
dynasties.  Conclusively  you  will  find  that  because  you  are 
king  of  a  nation,  it  does  not  follow  that  you  are  to  gather  for 
yourself  all  the  wealth  of  that  nation ;  neither,  because  you 
ure  king  of  a  small  part  of  the  nation,  and  lord  over  the  means; 
of  its  maintenance — over  field,  or  mill,  or  mine,  are  you  its 
take  all  the  produce  of  that  piece  of  the  foundation  of  na* 
tional  existence  for  yourself. 


TRAFFIC. 


63 


You  will  tell  me  I  need  not  preach  against  these  things,  for 
I  cannot  mend  them.  No,  good  friends,  I  cannot ;  but  you 
can,  and  you  will ;  or  something  else  can  and  will.  Do  you 
think  these  phenomena  are  to  stay  always  in  their  present 
power  or  aspect  ?  All  history  shows,  on  the  contrary,  that  to 
be  the  exact  thing  they  never  can  do.  Change  must  come  ; 
but  it  is  ours  to  determine  whether  change  of  growth,  or 
change  of  death.  Shall  the  Parthenon  be  in  ruins  on  its  rock, 
and  Bolton  priory  in  its  meadow,  but  these  mills  of  yours  be 
the  consummation  of  the  buildings  of  the  earth,  and  their 
wheels  be  as  the  wheels  of  eternity  ?  Think  you  that  '  men 
may  come,  and  men  may  go,'  but — mills — go  on  forever? 
Not  so ;  out  of  these,  better  or  worse  shall  come ;  and  it  is 
for  you  to  choose  which. 

I  know  that  none  of  this  wrong  is  done  with  deliberate  pur- 
pose. I  know,  on  the  contrary,  that  you  wish  your  workmen 
well ;  that  you  do  much  for  them,  and  that  you  desire  to  do 
more  for  them,  if  you  saw  your  way  to  it  safely.  I  know  that 
many  of  you  have  done,  and  are  every  day  doing,  whatever 
you  feel  to  be  in  your  power ;  and  that  even  all  this  wrong 
and  misery  are  brought  about  by  a  warped  sense  of  duty,  each 
of  you  striving  to  do  his  best,  without  noticing  that  this  best 
is  essentially  and  centrally  the  best  for  himself,  not  for  others. 
And  all  this  has  come  of  the  spreading  of  that  thrice  accursed, 
thrice  impious  doctrine  of  the  modern  economist,  that  f  To  do 
the  best  for  yourself,  is  finally  to  do  the  best  for  others.' 
Friends,  our  great  Master  said  not  so  ;  and  most  absolutely 
we  shall  find  this  world  is  not  made  so.  Indeed,  to  do  the 
best  for  others,  is  finally  to  do  the  best  for  ourselves ;  but  it 
will  not  do  to  have  our  eyes  fixed  on  that  issue.  The  Pagans 
had  got  beyond  that.  Hear  what  a  Pagan  says  of  this  matter  ; 
hear  what  were,  perhaps,  the  last  written  words  of  Plato, — if 
not  the  last  actually  written  (for  this  we  cannot  know),  yet 
assuredly  in  fact  and  power  his  parting  words— in  which,  en- 
deavouring to  give  full  crowning  and  harmonious  close  to  all 
his  thoughts,  and  to  speak  the  sum  of  them  by  the  imagined 
sentence  of  the  Great  Spirit,  his  strength  and  his  heart  fail 
him,  and  the  words  cease,  broken  off  for  ever.    It  is  the  close 


64 


THE  CROWN  OF  WILD  OLIVE. 


of  the  dialogue  called  6  Critias,'  in  which  he  describes,  partly 
from  real  tradition,  partly  in  ideal  dream,  the  early  state  of 
Athens ;  and  the  genesis,  and  order,  and  religion,  of  the 
fabled  isle  of  Atlantis  ;  in  which  genesis  he  conceives  the  same 
first  perfection  and  final  degeneracy  of  man,  which  in  our  own 
Scriptural  tradition  is  expressed  by  saying  that  the  Sons  of  God 
intermarried  with  the  daughters  of  men,  for  he  supposes  the 
earliest  race  to  have  been  indeed  the  children  of  God  ;  and  to 
have  corrupted  themselves,  until  '  their  spot  was  not  the  spot 
of  his  children.'  And  this,  he  says,  was  the  end  ;  that  indeed 
*  through  many  generations,  so  long  as  the  God's  nature  in 
them  yet  was  full,  they  were  submissive  to  the  sacred  laws, 
and  carried  themselves  lovingly  to  all  that  had  kindred  with 
them  in  divineness  ;  for  their  uttermost  spirit  was  faithful 
and  true,  and  in  every  wise  great ;  so  that,  in  all  meekness  of 
wisdom,  they  dealt  with  each  other,  and  took  all  the  chances 
of  life  ;  and  despising  all  things  except  virtue,  they  cared  little 
what  happened  day  by  day,  and  bore  lightly  the  burden  of  gold 
and  of  possessions ;  for  they  saw  that,  if  only  their  common 
love  and  virtue  increased,  all  these  things  would  be  increased 
together  with  them  ;  but  to  set  their  esteem  and  ardent  pur- 
suit upon  material  possession  would  be  to  lose  that  first,  and 
their  virtue  and  affection  together  with  it.  And  by  such 
reasoning,  and  what  of  the  divine  nature  remained  in  them, 
they  gained  all  this  greatness  of  which  we  have  already  told  , 
but  when  the  God's  part  of  them  faded  and  became  extinct, 
being  mixed  again  and  again,  and  effaced  by  the  prevalent 
mortality  ;  and  the  human  nature  at  last  exceeded,  they  then 
became  unable  to  endure  the  courses  of  fortune  ;  and  fell  into 
shapelessness  of  life,  and  baseness  in  the  sight  of  him  who 
could  see,  having  lost  everything  that  was  fairest  of  their  hon- 
our ;  while  to  the  blind  hearts  which  could  not  discern  the 
true  life,  tending  to  happiness,  it  seemed  that  they  were  then 
chiefly  noble  and  happy,  being  filled  with  all  iniquity  of  inor^ 
dinate  possession  and  power.  Whereupon,  the  God  of  God's, 
whose  Kinghood  is  in  laws,  beholding  a  once  just  nation  thus 
cast  into  misery,  and  desiring  to  lay  such  punishment  upon 
them  as  might  make  them  repent  into  restraining,  gathered 


TRAFFIC. 


65 


together  all  the  gods  into  his  dwelling-place,  which  from 
heaven's  centre  overlooks  whatever  has  part  in  creation ;  and 

having  assembled  them,  he  said '  

The  rest  is  silence.  So  ended  are  the  last  words  of  the 
chief  wisdom  of  the  heathen,  spoken  of  this  idol  of  riches ; 
this  idol  of  yours  ;  this  golden  image  high  by  measureless 
cubits,  set  up  where  your  green  fields  of  England  are  fur- 
nace-burnt into  the  likeness  of  the  plain  of  Dura :  this  idol, 
forbidden  to  us,  first  of  all  idols,  by  our  own  Master  and 
faith  ;  forbidden  to  us  also  by  every  human  lip  that  has  ever, 
in  any  age  or  people,  been  accounted  of  as  able  to  speak  ac* 
cording  to  the  purposes  of  God.  Continue  to  make  that  for- 
bidden deity  your  principal  one,  and  soon  no  more  art,  no 
more  science,  no  more  pleasure  will  be  possible.  Catastro- 
phe will  come  ;  or  worse  than  catastrophe,  slow  mouldering 
and  withering  into  Hades.  Bat  if  you  can  fix  some  concep- 
tion of  a  true  human  state  of  life  to  be  striven  for- — life  for  all 
men  as  for  yourselves— if  you  can  determine  some  honest  and 
simple  order  of  existence  ;  following  those  trodden  ways  of 
wisdom,  which  are  pleasantness,  and  seeking  her  quiet  and 
withdrawn  paths,  which  are  peace  ; — -then,  and  so  sanctifying 
wealth  into  'commonwealth,'  all  your  art,  your  literature, 
your  daily  labours,  your  domestic  affection,  and  citizen's  duty, 
will  join  and  increase  into  one  magnificent  harmony.  You 
will  know  then  how  to  build,  well  enough  ;  you  will  build 
with  stone  well,  but  with  flesh  better ;  temples  not  made 
with  hands,  but  riveted  of  hearts ;  and  that  kind  of  marble, 
crimson-veined?  is  indeed  eternal 
5 


LECTURE  III 


WAR. 

{Delivered  at  the  Royal  Military  Acadi  my,  Woolwich.) 

Young  soldiers,  I  do  not  doubt  but  that  many  of  you  came 
unwillingly  to-night,  and  many  in  merely  contemptuous 
curiosity,  to  hear  what  a  writer  on  painting  could  possibly  say, 
or  would  venture  to  say,  respecting  your  great  art  of  war. 
You  may  well  think  within  yourselves,  that  a  painter  might, 
perliaps  without  immodesty,  lecture  younger  painters  upon 
painting,  but  not  young  lawyers  upon  law,  nor  young  physi- 
cians upon  medicine — least  of  all,  it  may  seem  to  you,  young 
warriors  upon  war.  And,  indeed,  when  I  was  asked  to  address 
you,  I  declined  at  first,  and  declined  long  ;  for  I  felt  that  you 
would  not  be  interested  in  my  special  business,  and  would  cer- 
tainly think  there  was  small  need  for  me  to  come  to  teach  you 
yours.  Nay,  I  knew  that  there  ought  to  be  no  such  need,  for 
the  great  veteran  soldiers  of  England  are  now  men  every  way 
so  thoughtful,  so  noble,  and  so  good,  that  no  other  teaching 
than  their  knightly  example,  and  their  few  words  of  grave 
and  tried  counsel  should  be  either  necessary  for  you,  or  even, 
without  assurance  of  due  modesty  in  the  offerer,  endured  by 
you. 

But  being  asked,  not  once  nor  twice,  I  have  not  ventured 
persistently  to  refuse  ;  and  I  will  try,  in  very  few  words,  to 
lay  before  you  some  reason  why  you  should  accept  my  excuse, 
and  hear  me  patiently.  You  may  imagine  that  your  work  is 
wholly  foreign  to,  and  separate  from  mine.  So  far  from  that, 
all  the  pure  and  noble  arts  of  peace  are  founded  on  war  ;  no 
great  art  ever  yet  rose  on  earth,  but  among  a  nation  of  sol- 
diers.   There  is  no  art  among  a  shepherd  people,  if  it  remains 


WAR. 


at  peace.  There  is  no  art  among  an  agricultural  people,  if  it 
remains  at  peace.  Commerce  is  barely  consistent  with  fine  art ; 
but  cannot  produce  it.  Manufacture  not  only  is  unable  to 
produce  it,  but  invariably  destroys  whatever  seeds  of  it  exist. 
There  is  no  great  art  possible  to  a  nation  but  that  which  is 
based  on  battle. 

Now,  though  I  hope  you  love  fighting  for  its  own  sake,  you 
must,  I  imagine,  be  surprised  at  my  assertion  that  there  is 
any  such  good  fruit  of  fighting.  You  supposed,  probably, 
that  your  office  was  to  defend  the  works  of  peace,  but  cer- 
tainly not  to  found  them  :  nay,  the  common  course  of  war, 
you  may  have  thought,  was  only  to  destroy  them.  And  truly, 
I  who  tell  you  this  of  the  use  of  war,  should  have  been  the 
last  of  men  to  tell  you  so,  had  I  trusted  my  own  experience 
only.  Hear  why  :  I  have  given  a  considerable  part  of  my  life 
to  the  investigation  of  Venetian  painting  and  the  result  of  that 
enquiry  was  my  fixing  upon  one  man  as  the  greatest  of  all 
Venetians,  and  therefore,  as  I  believed,  of  all  painters  what- 
soever. I  formed  this  faith,  (whether  right  or  wrong  matters 
at  present  nothing,)  in  the  supremacy  of  the  painter  Tin  tore  t, 
under  a  roof  covered  with  his  pictures  ;  and  of  those  pictures, 
three  of  the  noblest  were  then  in  the  form  of  shreds  of  ragged 
canvas,  mixed  up  with  the  laths  cf  the  roof,  rent  through  by 
three  Austrian  shells.  Now  it  is  not  every  lecturer  who  could 
tell  you  that  he  had  seen  three  of  his  favourite  pictures  torn 
to  rags  by  bombshells.  And  after  such  a  sight,  it  is  not  every 
lecturer  who  ivould  tell  }^ou  that,  nevertheless,  war  was  the 
foundation  of  all  great  art. 

Yet  the  conclusion  is  inevitable,  from  any  careful  compari- 
son of  the  states  of  great  historic  races  at  different  periods. 
Merely  to  show  you  what  I  mean,  I  will  sketch  for  you,  very 
briefly,  the  broad  steps  of  the  advance  of  the  best  art  of  the 
world.  The  tirst  dawn  of  it  is  in  Egypt ;  and  the  power  of  it 
is  founded  on  the  perpetual  contemplation  of  death,  and  of 
future  judgment,  by  the  mind  of  a  nation  of  which  the  ruling 
caste  were  priests,  and  the  second,  soldiers.  The  greatest 
works  produced  by  them  are  sculptures  of  their  kings  going 
out  to  battle,  or  receiving  the  homage  of  conquered  armiea 


68 


THE  CROWN  OF  WILD  OLIVE. 


And  you  must  remember  also,  as  one  of  the  great  keys  to  the 
splendour  of  the  Egyptian  nation,  that  the  priests  were  not 
occupied  in  theology  only.  Their  theology  was  the  basis  of 
practical  government  and  law,  so  that  they  were  not  so  much 
priests  as  religious  judges,  the  office  of  Samuel,  among  the 
Jews,  being  as  nearly  as  possible  correspondent  to  theirs. 

All  the  rudiments  of  art  then,  and  much  more  than  the 
rudiments  of  all  science,  are  laid  first  by  this  great  warrior- 
nation,  which  held  in  contempt  all  mechanical  trades,  and  in 
absolute  hatred  the  peaceful  life  of  shepherds.  From  Egypt 
art  passes  directly  into  Greece,  where  all  poetry,  and  all 
painting,  are  nothing  else  than  the  description,  praise,  or 
dramatic  representation  of  war,  or  of  the  exercises  which 
prepare  for  it,  in  their  connection  with  offices  of  religion. 
All  Greek  institutions  had  first  respect  to  war ;  and  their  con- 
ception of  it,  as  one  necessary  office  of  all  human  and  divine 
life,  is  expressed  simply  by  the  images  of  their  guiding  gods. 
Apollo  is  the  god  of  all  wisdom  of  the  intellect  ;  he  bears  the 
arrow  and  the  bow,  before  he  bears  the  lyre.  Again,  Athena 
is  the  goddess  of  all  wisdom  in  conduct  It  is  by  the  helmet 
and  the  shield,  oftener  than  by  the  shuttle,  that  she  is  distin- 
guished from  other  deities. 

There  were,  however,  two  great  differences  in  principle  be- 
tween the  Greek  and  the  Egyptian  theories  of  policy.  In 
Greece  there  was  no  soldier  caste  ;  every  citizen  was  neces- 
sarily a  soldier.  And,  again,  while  the  Greeks  rightly  de- 
spised mechanical  arts  as  much  as  the  Egyptians,  they  did 
not  make  the  fatal  mistake  of  despising  agricultural  and  pas- 
toral life  ;  but  perfectly  honoured  both.  These  two  conditions 
of  truer  thought  raise  them  quite  into  the  highest  rank  of  wise 
manhood  that  has  yet  been  reached ;  for  all  our  great  arts, 
and  nearly  all  our  great  thoughts,  have  been  borrowed  or  de- 
rived from  them.  Take  away  from  us  what  they  have  given  ; 
and  I  hardly  can  imagine  how  low  the  modern  European 
would  stand. 

Now,  you  are  to  remember,  in  passing  to  the  next  phase  of 
history,  that  though  you  must  have  war  to  produce  art — you 
must  also  have  much  more  than  war ;  namely,  an  art-instinct 


WAR 


69 


or  genius  in  the  people  ;  and  that,  though  all  the  talent  foi 
painting  in  the  world  won't  make  painters  of  you,  unless  you 
have  a  gift  for  fighting  as  well,  you  may  have  the  gift  for 
fighting,  and  none  for  painting.  Now,  in  the  next  great  dj- 
nasty  of  soldiers,  the  art-instinct  is  wholly  wanting.  I  have 
not  yet  investigated  the  Eoman  character  enough  to  tell  you 
the  causes  of  this  ;  but  I  believe,  paradoxical  as  it  may  seem 
to  you,  that,  however  truly  the  Roman  might  say  of  himself 
that  he  was  born  of  Mars,  and  suckled  by  the  wolf,  he  was 
nevertheless,  at  heart,  more  of  a  farmer  than  a  soldier.  The 
exercises  of  war  were  with  him  practical,  not  poetical ;  his 
poetry  was  in  domestic  life  only,  and  the  object  of  battle, 
'pacis  imponere  morem.'  And  the  arts  are  extinguished  in 
his  hands,  and  do  not  rise  again,  until,  with  Gothic  chivalry, 
there  comes  back  into  the  mind  of  Europe  a  passionate  de- 
light in  war  itself,  for  the  sake  of  war.  And  then,  with  the 
romantic  knighthood  which  can  imagine  no  other  noble  em- 
ployment,— under  the  fighting  kings  of  France,  England,  and 
Spain  ;  and  under  the  fighting  dukeships  and  citizenships  of 
Italy,  art  is  born  again,  and  rises  to  her  height  in  the  great 
valleys  of  Lombardy  and  Tuscany,  through  which  there  flows 
not  a  single  stream,  from  all  their  Alps  or  Apennines,  that  did 
not  once  run  dark  red  from  battle  :  and  it  reaches  its  culmi- 
nating glory  in  the  city  which  gave  to  history  the  most  in- 
tense type  of  soldiership  yet  seen  among  men  ; — the  city 
whose  armies  were  led  in  their  assault  by  their  king,  led 
through  it  to  victory  by  their  king,  and  so  led,  though  that 
king  of  theirs  was  blind,  and  in  the  extremity  of  his  age. 

And  from  this  time  forward,  as  peace  is  established  or  ex- 
tended in  Europe,  the  arts  decline.  They  reach  an  un- 
paralleled pitch  of  costliness,  but  lose  their  life,  enlist  them- 
selves at  last  on  the  side  of  luxury  and  various  corruption, 
and,  among  wholly  tranquil  nations,  wither  utterly  away  ; 
remaining  only  in  partial  practice  among  races  who,  like  the 
French  and  us,  have  still  the  minds,  though  we  cannot  all 
live  the  lives,  of  soldiers. 

'It  may  be  so/ I  can  suppose  that  a  philanthropist  might 
exclaim.    'Perish  then  the  arts,  if  they  can  flourish  only  at 


70 


THE  CROWN  OF  WILD  OLIVE, 


such  a  cost.  What  worth  is  there  in  toys  of  canvas  and  stone, 
if  compared  to  the  joy  and  peace  of  artless  domestic  life?* 
And  the  answer  is — truly,  in  themselves,  none.  But  as  expres- 
sions of  the  highest  state  of  the  human  spirit,  their  worth  is  in- 
finite. As  results  they  may  be  worthless,  but,  as  signs,  they 
are  above  price.  For  it  is  an  assured  truth  that,  whenever 
the  faculties  of  men  are  at  their  fulness,  they  must  express 
themselves  by  art ;  and  to  say  that  a  state  is  without  such  ex- 
pression, is  to  say  that  it  is  sunk  from  its  proper  level  of 
manly  nature.  So  that,  when  I  tell  you  that  war  is  the  foun- 
dation of  all  the  arts,  I  mean  also  that  it  is  the  foundation  of 
all  the  high  virtues  and  faculties  of  men. 

It  was  very  strange  to  me  to  discover  this  ;  and  very  dread- 
ful— but  I  saw  it  to  be  quite  an  undeniable  fact.  The  com- 
mon notion  that  peace  and  the  virtues  of  civil  life  flourished 
together,  I  found,  to  be  wholly  untenable.  Peace  and  the 
vices  of  civil  life  only  flourish  together.  We  talk  of  peace 
and  learning,  and  of  peace  and  plenty,  and  of  peace  and  civil- 
isation ;  but  I  found  that  those  were  not  the  words  which  the 
Muse  of  History  coupled  together  :  that  on  her  lips,  the  words 
were — peace  and  sensuality,  peace  and  selfishness,  peace  and 
corruption,  peace  and  death.  I  found,  in  brief,  that  all  great 
nations  learned  their  truth  of  word,  and  strength  of  thought, 
in  war  ;  that  they  were  nourished  in  war,  and  wasted  by  peace  ; 
taught  by  war,  and  deceived  by  peace  ;  trained  by  war,  and 
betrayed  by  peace  ; — in  a  word,  that  they  were  born  in  war, 
and  expired  in  peace. 

Yet  now  note  carefully,  in  the  second  place,  it  is  not  all  war 
of  which  this  can  be  said — nor  all  dragon's  teeth,  which, 
sown,  will  start  up  into  men.  It  is  not  the  ravage  of  a  bar- 
barian wolf-flock,  as  under  Genseric  or  Suwarrow ;  nor  the 
habitual  restlessness  and  rapine  of  mountaineers,  as  on  the 
old  borders  of  Scotland  ;  nor  the  occasional  struggle  of  a 
strong  peaceful  nation  for  its  life,  as  in  the  wars  of  the  Swiss 
with  Austria  ;  nor  the  contest  of  merely  ambitious  nations 
for  extent  of  power,  as  in  the  wars  of  France  under  Napoleon, 
or  the  just  terminated  war  in  America,  None  of  these  forms 
of  war  build  anything  but  tombs.    But  the  creative  or  foun- 


WAR 


71 


dational  war  is  that  in  which  the  natural  restlessness  and  love 
of  contest  among  men  are  disciplined,  by  consent,  into  modes 
of  beautiful — though  it  may  be  fatal — play  :  in  which  the  nat- 
ural ambition  and  love  of  power  of  men  are  disciplined  into 
the  aggressive  conquest  of  surrounding  evil :  and  in  which  the 
natural  instincts  of  self-defence  are  sanctified  by  the  nobleness 
of  the  institutions,  and  purity  of  the  households,  which  they 
are  appointed  to  defend.  To  such  war  as  this  all  men  are 
born  ;  in  such  war  as  this  any  man  may  happily  die  ;  and  forth 
from  such  war  as  this  have  arisen  throughout  the  extent  of 
past  ages,  all  the  highest  sanctities  and  virtues  of  humanity. 

I  shall  therefore  divide  the  war  of  which  I  would  speak  to 
you  into  three  heads.  War  for  exercise  or  play  ;  war  for  do- 
minion ;  and,  war  for  defence. 

I.  And  first,  of  war  for  exercise  or  play.  I  speak  of  it  pri- 
marily in  this  light,  because,  through  all  past  history,  manly 
wTar  has  been  more  an  exercise  than  anything  else,  among  the 
classes  who  cause,  and  proclaim  it.  It  is  not  a  game  to  the  con- 
script, or  the  pressed  sailor ;  but  neither  of  these  are  the 
causers  of  it.  To  the  governor  who  determines  that  war  shall 
be,  and  to  the  youths  who  voluntarily  adopt  it  as  their  pro- 
fession, it  has  always  been  a  grand  pastime  ;  and  chiefly  pur- 
sued because  they  had  nothing  else  to  do.  And  this  is  true 
without  any  exception.  No  king  whose  mind  was  fully  occu- 
pied with  the  development  of  the  inner  resources  of  his  king- 
dom, or  with  any  other  sufficing  subject  of  thought,  ever  en- 
tered into  war  but  on  compulsion.  No  youth  who  was 
earnestly  busy  with  any  peaceful  subject  of  study,  or  set  on 
any  serviceable  course  of  action,  ever  voluntarily  became  a 
soldier.  Occupy  him  early,  and  wisely,  in  agriculture  or 
business,  in  science  or  in  literature,  and  he  will  never  think  of 
war  otherwise  than  as  a  calamity.  But  leave  him  idle  ;  and, 
the  more  brave  and  active  and  capable  he  is  by  nature,  the 
more  he  will  thirst  for  some  appointed  field  for  action  ;  and 
find,  in  the  passion  and  peril  of  battle,  the  only  satisfying  ful- 
filment of  his  unoccupied  being.  And  from  the  earliest  in- 
cipient civilisation  until  now,  the  population  of  the  earth 
divides  itself,  when  you  look  at  it  widely,  into  two  races  ;  one 


72 


TEE  CBOWN  OF  WILD  OLIVE. 


of  workers,  and  the  other  of  players — one  tilling  the  ground, 
manufacturing,  building,  and  otherwise  providing  for  the 
necessities  of  life  ; — the  other  part  proudly  idle,  and  continu- 
ally therefore  needing  recreation,  in  which  they  use  the  pro- 
ductive and  laborious  orders  partly  as  their  cattle,  and  partly 
as  their  puppets  or  pieces  in  the  game  of  death. 

Now,  remember,  whatever  virtue  or  goodliness  there  may  be 
in  this  game  of  war,  rightly  played,  there  is  none  when  you 
thus  play  it  with  a  multitude  of  small  human  pawns. 

If  you,  the  gentlemen  of  this  or  any  other  kingdom,  choose 
to  make  your  pastime  of  contest,  do  so,  and  welcome  ;  but 
set  not  up  these  unhappy  peasant-pieces  upon  the  green 
fielded  board.  If  the  wager  is  to  be  of  death,  lay  it  on  your 
own  heads,  not  theirs.  A  goodly  struggle  in  the  Olympic 
dust,  though  it  be  the  dust  of  the  grave,  the  gods  will  look 
upon,  and  be  with  you  in  ;  but  they  will  not  be  with  you,  if 
you  sit  on  the  sides  of  the  amphitheatre,  whose  steps  are  the 
mountains  of  earth,  whose  arena  its  valleys,  to  urge  your 
peasant  millions  into  gladiatorial  war.  You  also,  you  tender 
and  delicate  women,  for  whom,  and  by  whose  command,  all 
true  battle  has  been,  and  must  ever  be  ;  you  would  perhaps 
shrink  now,  though  you  need  not,  from  the  thought  of  sitting 
as  queens  above  set  lists  where  the  jousting  game  might  be 
mortal.  How  much  more,  then,  ought  you  to  shrink  from 
the  thought  of  sitting  above  a  theatre  pit  in  which  even  a 
few  condemned  slaves  were  slaying  each  other  only  for  your 
delight !  And  do  you  not  shrink  from  the  fact  of  sitting 
above  a  theatre  pit,  where, — not  condemned  slaves, — but  the 
best  and  bravest  of  the  poor  sons  of  your  people,  slay  each 
other, — not  man  to  man, — as  the  coupled  gladiators  ;  but 
race  to  race,  in  duel  of  generations?  You  would  tell  me, 
perhaps,  that  you  do  not  sit  to  see  this  ;  and  it  is  indeed 
true,  that  the  women  of  Europe — those  who  have  no  heart- 
interests  of  their  own  at  peril  in  the  contest — draw  the  cur- 
tains of  their  boxes,  and  muffle  the  openings  ;  so  that  from 
the  pit  of  the  circus  of  slaughter  there  may  reach  them  only 
at  intervals  a  half -heard  cry  and  a  murmur  as  of  the  wind's 
sighing,  when  myriads  of  souls  expire.    They  shut  out  the 


WAR. 


73 


death-cries ;  and  are  happy,  and  talk  wittily  among  them- 
selves. That  is  the  utter  literal  fact  of  what  our  ladies  do  in 
their  pleasant  lives. 

Nay,  you  might  answer,  speaking  for  them— 'We  do  not 
let  these  wars  come  to  pass  for  our  play,  nor  by  our  careless- 
ness; we  cannot  help  them.  How  can  any  final  quarrel  of 
nations  be  settled  otherwise  than  by  war  ? '  I  cannot  now 
delay,  to  tell  you  how  political  quarrels  might  be  otherwise 
settled.  But  grant  that  they  cannot.  Grant  that  no  law  of 
reason  can  be  understood  by  nations ;  no  law  of  justice  sub- 
mitted to  by  them  :  and  that,  while  questions  of  a  few  acres, 
and  of  petty  cash,  can  be  determined  by  truth  and  equity, 
the  questions  which  are  to  issue  in  the  perishing  or  saving  of 
kingdoms  can  be  determined  only  by  the  truth  of  the  sword, 
and  the  equity  of  the  rifle.  Grant  this,  and  even  then,  judge 
if  it  will  always  be  necessary  for  you  to  put  your  quarrel  into 
the  hearts  of  your  poor,  and  sign  your  treaties  with  peasants' 
blood.  You  would  be  ashamed  to  do  this  in  your  own  private 
position  and  power.  Why  should  you  not  be  ashamed  also 
to  do  it  in  public  place  and  power  ?  If  you  quarrel  with  your 
neighbour,  and  the  quarrel  be  indeterminable  by  law,  and 
mortal,  you  and  he  do  not  send  your  footmen  to  Battersea 
fields  to  fight  it  out ;  nor  do  you  set  fire  to  his  tenants'  cot- 
tages, nor  spoil  their  goods.  You  fight  out  your  quarrel 
yourselves,  and  at  your  own  danger,  if  at  all.  And  you  do 
not  think  it  materially  affects  the  arbitrement  that  one  of  you 
has  a  larger  household  than  the  other  ;  so  that,  if  the  servants 
or  tenants  were  brought  into  the  field  with  their  masters,  the 
issue  of  the  contest  could  not  be  doubtful?  You  either 
refuse  the  private  duel,  or  you  practise  it  under  laws  of 
honour,  not  of  physical  force  ;  that  so  it  may  be,  in  a  manner, 
justly  concluded.  Now  the  just  or  unjust  conclusion  of  the 
private  feud  is  of  little  moment,  while  the  just  or  unjust  con- 
clusion of  the  public  feud  is  of  eternal  moment :  and  yet,  in 
this  public  quarrel,  you  take  your  servants'  sons  from  thei>, 
arms  to  fight  for  it,  and  your  servants'  food  from  their  lips  to 
support  it ;  and  the  black  seals  on  the  parchment  of  your 
treaties  of  peace  are  the  deserted  hearth  and  the  fruitless  field 


74 


THE  CROWN  OF  WILD  OLIVE. 


There  is  a  ghastly  ludicrousness  in  this,  as  there  is  mostly  iii 
these  wide  and  universal  crimes.  Hear  the  statement  of  the 
very  fact  of  it  in  the  most  literal  words  of  the  greatest  of  ouir 
English  thinkers  : — 

4  What,  speaking  in  quite  unofficial  language,  is  the  net-purport  and 
upshot  of  war  ?  To  my  own  knowledge,  for  example,  there  dwell  and 
toil,  in  the  British  village  of  Dumdrudge,  usually  some  five  hundred 
souls.  From  these,  by  certain  M  natural  enemies"  of  the  French,  there 
are  successively  selected,  during  the  French  war,  say  thirty  able-bodied 
men.  Dumdrudge,  at  her  own  expense,  has  suckled  and  nursed  them  ; 
she  has,  not  without  difficulty  and  sorrow,  fed  them  up  to  manhood, 
and  even  trained  them  to  crafts,  so  that  one  can  weave,  another  build, 
another  hammer,  and  the  weakest  can  stand  under  thirty  stone  avoir- 
dupois. Nevertheless,  amid  much  weeping  and  swearing,  they  are  se- 
lected ;  all  dressed  in  red  ;  and  shipped  away,  at  the  public  charges, 
some  two  thousand  miles,  or  say  only  to  the  south  of  Spain  ;  and  fed 
there  till  wanted. 

4  And  now  to  that  same  spot  in  the  south  of  Spain  are  thirty  similar 
French  artisans,  from  a  French  Dumdrudge,  in  like  manner  wending  ; 
till  at  length,  after  infinite  effort,  the  two  parties  come  into  actual 
juxtaposition  ;  and  Thirty  stands  fronting  Thirty,  each  with  a  gun  in 
his  hand. 

'Straightway  the  word  "  Fire  !  "  is  given,  and  they  blow  the  souls 
out  of  one  another,  and  in  place  of  sixty  brisk  useful  craftsmen,  the 
world  has  sixty  dead  carcases,  which  it  must  bury,  and  anon  shed  tears 
for.  Had  these  men  any  quarrel  ?  Busy  as  the  devil  is,  not  the  small- 
est !  They  lived  far  enough  apart ;  were  the  entirest  strangers  ;  nay, 
in  so  wide  a  universe,  there  was  even,  unconsciously,  by  commerce, 
some  mutual  helpfulness  between  them.  How  then  ?  Simpleton ! 
their  governors  had  fallen  out ;  and  instead  of  shooting  one  another  , 
had  the  cunning  to  make  these  poor  blockheads  shoot.'  (Sartor  Be- 
sartus.) 

Positively,  then,  gentlemen,  the  game  of  battle  must  not, 
and  shall  not,  ultimately  be  played  this  way.  But  should  it 
be  played  anyway?  Should  it,  if  not  by  your  servants,  b(% 
practised  by  yourselves?  I  think,  yes.  Both  history  and 
human  instinct  seem  alike  to  say,  yes.  All  healthy  men  like 
fighting,  and  like  the  sense  of  danger ;  all  brave  women  like 
to  hear  of  their  fighting,  and  of  their  facing  danger.  This  is 
a  fixed  instinct  in  the  fine  race  of  them  ;  and  I  cannot  help 


I 


WAR 


75 


fancying  that  fair  fight  is  the  best  play  for  them  ;  and  that  a 
tournament  was  a  better  game  than  a  steeple-chase.  The 
time  may  perhaps  come  in  France  as  well  as  here,  for  univer- 
sal hurdle-races  and  cricketing  :  but  I  do  not  think  universal 
'  crickets '  will  bring  out  the  best  qualities  of  the  nobles  of 
either  country.  I  use,  hi  such  question,  the  test  which  I  have 
adopted,  of  the  connection  of  wTar  with  other  arts  ;  and  I  re* 
fleet  how,  as  a  sculptor,  I  should  feel,  if  I  were  asked  to  de- 
sign a  monument  for  a  dead  knight,  in  Westminster  abbey, 
with  a  carving  of  a  bat  at  one  end,  and  a  ball  at  the  other. 
It  may  be  the  remains  in  me  only  of  savage  Gothic  prejudice  ; 
but  I  had  rather  carve  it  with  a  shield  at  one  end,  and  a 
sword  at  the  other.  And  this,  observe,  with  no  reference 
whatever  to  any  story  of  duty  done,  or  cause  defended.  As- 
sume the  knight  merely  to  have  ridden  out  occasionally  to 
fight  his  neighbour  for  exercise  ;  assume  him  even  a  soldier 
of  fortune,  and  to  have  gained  his  bread,  and  filled  his  purse, 
at  the  sword's  point.  Still,  I  feel  as  if  it  were,  somehow, 
grander  and  worthier  in  him  to  have  made  his  bread  by  sword 
play  than  any  other  play  ;  *  had  rather  he  had  made  it  by 
thrusting  than  by  batting  ; — much  more,  than  by  betting. 
Much  rather  that  he  should  ride  war  horses,  than  back  race 
horses  ;  and — I  say  it  sternly  and  deliberately — much  rather 
would  I  have  him  slay  his  neighbour,  than  cheat  him. 

But  remember,  so  far  as  this  may  be  true,  the  game  of  war 
is  only  that  in  which  the  f  ull  personal  power  of  the  human 
creature  is  brought  out  in  management  of  its  weapons.  And 
this  for  three  reasons  : — 

First,  the  great  justification  of  this  game  is  that  it  truly, 
when  well  played,  determines  who  is  the  best  man  ; — who  is 
the  highest  bred,  the  most  self-denying,  the  most  fearless, 
the  coolest  of  nerve,  the  swiftest  of  eye  and  hand.  You  can- 
not test  these  qualities  wholly,  unless  there  is  a  clear  possi- 
bility of  the  struggle's  ending  in  death.  It  is  only  in  the 
fronting  of  that  condition  that  the  full  trial  of  the  man,  soul 
and  body,  comes  out.  You  may  go  to  your  game  of  wickets, 
or  of  hurdles,  or  of  cards,  and  any  knavery  that  is  in  you  may 
stay  unchallenged  all  the  while*    But  if  the  play  may  fos 


re 


THE  CROWN  OF  WILD  OLIVE. 


ended  at  any  moment  by  a  lance-thrust,  a  man  will  probably 
make  up  his  accounts  a  little  before  he  enters  it.  Whatever 
is  rotten  and  evil  in  him  will  weaken  his  hand  mors  in  hold- 
ing a  sword  hilt,  than  in  balancing  a  billiard  cue  ;  and  on  the 
whole,  the  habit  of  living  lightly  hearted,  in  daily  presence  ot 
death,  always  has  had,  and  must  have,  a  tendency  both  to  the 
making  and  testing  of  honest  men.  But  for  the  final  testings 
observe,  you  must  make  the  issue  of  battle  strictly  dependent 
on  fineness  of  frame,  and  firmness  of  hand.  You  must  not 
make  it  the  question,  which  of  the  combatants  has  the  longest 
gun,  or  which  has  got  bohind  the  biggest  tree,  or  which  has 
the  wind  in  his  face,  or  which  has  gunpowder  made  by  the 
best  chemist,  or  iron  smelted  with  the  best  coal,  or  the 
angriest  mob  at  his  back.  Decide  your  battle,  whether  of 
nations,  or  individuals,  on  those  terms ; — and  you  have  only 
multiplied  confusion,  and  added  slaughter  to  iniquity.  But 
decide  your  battle  by  pure  trial  which  has  the  strongest  arm, 
and  steadiest  heart, — and  you  have  gone  far  to  decide  a  great 
many  matters  besides,  and  to  decide  them  rightly. 

And  the  other  reasons  for  this  mode  of  decision  of  cause, 
are  the  diminution  both  of  the  material  destructiveness,  or 
cost,  and  of  the  physical  distress  of  wTar.  For  you  must  not 
think  that  in  speaking  to  you  in  this  (as  you  may  imagine), 
fantastic  praise  of  battle,  I  have  overlooked  the  conditions 
weighing  against  me.  I  pray  all  of  you,  who  have  not  read, 
to  read  with  the  most  earnest  attention,  Mr.  Helps's  two  essays 
on  War  and  Government,  in  the  first  volume  of  the  last  series 
of  '  Friends  in  Council/  Everything  that  can  be  urged  against 
war  is  there  simply,  exhaustively,  and  most  graphically  stated. 
And  all,  there  urged,  is  true.  But  the  two  great  counts  of 
evil  alleged  against  war  by  that  most  thoughtful  writer,  hold 
only  against  modern  war.  If  you  have  to  take  away  masses 
of  men  from  all  industrial  employment, — to  feed  them  by  the 
labour  of  others, — to  move  them  and  provide  them  with  de- 
structive machines,  varied  daily  in  national  rivalship  of  invent- 
ive cost ;  if  you  have  to  ravage  the  country  which  you  attack, — 
to  destroy  for  a  score  of  future  years,  its  roads,  its  woods,  its 
cities,  and  its  harbours ; — and  if,  finally,  having  brought  masses 


WAR. 


77 


of  men,  counted  by  hundreds  of  thousands,  face  to  face,  you 
tear  those  masses  to  pieces  with  jagged  shot,  and  leave  the  frag- 
ments of  living  creatures  countlessly  beyond  all  help  of  sur- 
gery, to  starve  and  parch,  through  days  of  torture,  down  into 
clots  of  clay — what  book  of  accounts  shall  record  the  cost  of 
your  work  ; — What  book  of  judgment  sentence  the  guilt  of  it? 

That,  I  say,  is  modern  war, — scientific  war, — chemical  and 
mechanic  war,  worse  even  than  the  savage's  poisoned  arrow. 
And  yet  you  will  tell  me,  perhaps,  that  any  other  war  than 
this  is  impossible  now.  It  may  be  so ;  the  progress  of  science 
cannot,  perhaps,  be  otherwise  registered  than  by  new  facilities 
of  destruction  ;  and  the  brotherly  love  of  our  enlarging  Chris- 
tianity be  only  proved  by  multiplication  of  murder.  Yet  hear, 
for  a  moment,  what  war  was,  in  Pagan  and  ignorant  days ; — 
what  war  might  yet  be,  if  we  could  extinguish  our  science  in 
darkness,  and  join  the  heathen's  practice  to  the  Christian's 
theory.  I  read  you  this  from  a  book  which  probably  most  of 
you  know  well,  and  all  ought  to  know — Muller's  '  Dorians  ; 9 — 
but  I  have  put  the  points  I  wish  you  to  remember  in  closer 
connection  than  in  his  text. 

'The  chief  characteristic  of  the  warriors  of  Sparta  was  great 
composure  and  subdued  strength ;  the  violence  (kvaaa)  of 
Aristodemus  and  Xsaclas  being  considered  as  deserving  rather 
of  blame  than  praise  ;  and  these  qualities  in  general  distin- 
guished the  Greeks  from  the  northern  Barbarians,  whose  bold- 
ness always  consisted  in  noise  and  tumulfc.  For  the  same  rea- 
son the  Spartans  sacrificed  to  the  Muses  before  an  action  ;  these 
goddesses  being  expected  to  produce  regularity  and  order  in 
battle  ;  as  they  sacrificed  on  the  same  occasion  in  Crete  to  the 
god  of  love,  as  the  confirmer  of  mutual  esteem  and  shame. 
Every  man  put  on  a  crown,  when  the  band  of  flute-players 
gave  the  signal  for  attack  ;  all  the  shields  of  the  line  glittered 
with  their  high  polish,  and  mingled  their  splendour  with  the 
dark  red  of  the  purple  mantles,  which  were  meant  both  to 
adorn  the  combatant,  and  to  conceal  the  blood  of  the  wounded ; 
to  fall  well  and  decorously  being  an  incentive  the  more  to  the 
most  heroic  valour.  The  conduct  of  the  Spartans  in  battle 
denotes  a  high  and  noble  disposition,  which  rejected  all  the 


78 


THE  GROWN  OF  WILD  OLIVE. 


extremes  of  brutal  rage.  The  pursuit  of  the  enemy  ceased 
when  the  victory  was  completed  ;  and  after  the  signal  for  retreat 
had  been  given,  all  hostilities  ceased.  The  spoiling  of  arms, 
at  least  during  the  battle,  was  also  interdicted  ;  and  the  con- 
secration of  the  spoils  of  slain  enemies  to  the  gods,  as,  in  gen- 
eral, all  rejoicings  for  victory,  were  considered  as  ill-omened,' 

Such  was  the  war  of  the  greatest  soldiers  wTho  prayed  to 
heathen  gods.  What  Christian  war  is,  preached  by  Christian 
ministers,  let  any  one  tell  you,  who  saw  the  sacred  crowning, 
and  heard  the  sacred  flute-playing,  and  wTas  inspired  and 
sanctified  by  the  divinely-measured  and  musical  language,  of 
any  North  American  regiment  preparing  for  its  charge.  And 
what  is  the  relative  cost  of  life  in  pagan  and  Christian  wars, 
let  this  one  fact  tell  you  : — the  Spartans  won  the  decisive  bat- 
tle of  Corinth  with  the  loss  of  eight  men  ;  the  victors  at  in- 
decisive Gettysburg  confess  to  the  loss  of  30,000. 

II.  I  pass  now  to  our  second  order  of  war,  the  commonest 
among  men,  that  undertaken  in  desire  of  dominion.  And  let 
me  ask  you  to  think  for  a  few  moments  what  the  real  mean- 
ing of  this  desire  of  dominion  is — first  in  the  minds  of  kings 
— then  in  that  of  nations. 

Now,  mind  you  this  first, — that  I  speak  either  about  kings, 
or  masses  of  men,  with  a  fixed  conviction  that  human  nature 
is  a  noble  and  beautiful  thing  ;  not  a  foul  nor  a  base  thing. 
All  the  sin  of  men  I  esteem  as  their  disease,  not  their  nature  ; 
as  a  folly  which  may  be  prevented,  not  a  necessity  which 
must  be  accepted.  And  my  wonder,  even  when  things  are  at 
their  wTorst,  is  always  at  the  height  which  this  human  nature 
can  attain.  Thinking  it  high,  I  find  it  always  a  higher  thing 
than  I  thought  it  ;  while  those  who  think  it  low,  find  it,  and 
will  find  it,  always  lower  than  they  thought  it :  the  fact  being, 
that  it  is  infinite,  and  capable  of  infinite  height  and  infinite 
fall  ;  but  the  nature  of  it — and  here  is  the  faith  which  I  wTould 
have  you  hold  with  me — the  nature  of  it  is  in  the  nobleness, 
not  in  the  catastrophe. 

Take  the  faith  in  its  utmost  terms.  When  the  captain  of 
the  '  London '  shook  hands  with  his  mate,  saying  '  God  speed 
you  !  I  will  go  down  with  my  passengers/  that  I  believe  to  be 


WAR 


79 


'human  nature.'  He  does  not  do  it  from  any  religious  motive 
—from  any  hope  of  reward,  or  any  fear  of  punishment ;  ho 
does  it  because  he  is  a  man.  Bat  when  a  mother,  living  among 
the  fair  fields  of  merry  England,  gives  her  two-year-old  child 
to  be  suffocated  under  a  mattress  in  her  inner  room,  while  the 
said  mother  waits  and  talks  outside  ;  that  I  believe  to  be  not 
human  nature.  You  have  the  two  extremes  there,  shortly. 
And  you,  men,  and  mothers,  who  are  here  face  to  face  with  * 
me  to-night,  I  call  upon  you  to  say  which  of  these  is  human, 
and  which  inhuman — which  'natural'  and  which  'unnat- 
ural?' Choose  your  creed  at  once,  I  beseech  you  : — choose  it 
with  unshaken  choice — choose  it  forever.  Will  you  take,  for 
foundation  of  act  and  hope,  the  faith  that  this  man  was  such 
as  God  made  him,  or  that  this  woman  was  such  as  God  made 
her  ?  Which  of  them  has  failed  from  their  nature — from  their 
present,  possible,  actual  nature  ; — not  their  nature  of  long 
ago,  but  their  nature  of  now  ?  Which  has  betrayed  it — falsi- 
fied it  ?  Did  the  guardian  who  died  in  his  trust,  die  inhu- 
manly, and  as  a  fool  ;  and  did  the  murderess  of  her  child 
fulfil  the  law  of  her  being?  Choose,  I  say  ;  infinitude  of 
choices  hang  upon  this.  You  have  had  false  prophets  among 
you — for  centuries  you  have  had  them — solemnly  warned 
against  them  though  you  were  ;  false  prophets,  who  have  told 
you  that  all  men  are  nothing  but  fiends  or  wolves,  half  beast, 
half  devil.  Believe  that  and  indeed  you  may  sink  to  that. 
But  refuse  that,  and  have  faith  that  God  £  made  you  upright,' 
though  you  have  sought  out  many  inventions ;  so,  you  will 
strive  daily  to  become  more  wnat  vour  Maker  meant  and 
means  you  to  be,  and  daily  gives  y^ou  also  the  power  to  be — 
and  you  will  cling  more  and  more  to  the  nobleness  and  virtue 
that  is  in  you,  saying,  '  My  righteousness  I  hold  fast,  and  will 
not  let  it  go.' 

I  have  put  this  to  you  as  a  choice,  as  if  you  might  hold 
either  of  these  creeds  you  liked  best.  But  there  is  in  reality 
no  choice  for  you  ;  the  facts  being  quite  easily  ascertainable. 
You  have  no  business  to  think  about  this  matter,  or  to  choose 
in  it.  The  broad  fact  is,  that  a  human  creature  of  the  highest 
race,  and  most  perfect  as  a  human  thing,  is  invariably  both 


80 


THE  CROWN  OF  WILD  OLIVE. 


kind  and  true  ;  and  that  as  you  lower  the  race,  you  get  cruelty 
and  falseness,  as  you  get  deformity  :  and  this  so  steadily  and 
assuredly,  that  the  two  great  words  which,  in  their  first  use, 
meant  only  perfection  of  race,  have  come,  by  consequence  of 
the  invariable  connection  of  virtue  with  the  fine  human  nature, 
both  to  signify  benevolence  of  disposition.  The  word  gener- 
ous, and  the  word  gentle,  both,  in  their  origin,  meant  only 
'of  pure  race/  but  because  charity  and  tenderness  are  insep- 
arable from  this  purity  of  blood,  the  words  which  once  stood 
only  for  pride,  now  stand  as  synonyms  for  virtue. 

Now,  this  being  the  true  power  of  our  inherent  humanity, 
and  seeing  that  all  the  aim  of  education  should  be  to  develop 
this  ; — and  seeing  also  what  magnificent  self  sacrifice  the 
higher  classes  of  men  are  capable  of,  for  any  cause  that  they 
understand  or  feel, — it  is  wholly  inconceivable  to  me  how  well- 
educated  princes,  who  ought  to  be  of  all  gentlemen  the  gen- 
tlest, and  of  all  nobles  the  most  generous,  and  whose  title  of 
royalty  means  only  their  function  of  doing  every  man  6  right1 
— how  these,  I  say,  throughout  history,  should  so  rarely  pro- 
nounce themselves  on  the  side  of  the  poor  and  of  justice,  but 
continually  maintain  themselves  and  their  own  interests  by 
oppression  of  the  poor,  and  by  wresting  of  justice  ;  and.  how 
this  should  be  accepted  as  so  natural,  that  the  word  loyalty, 
which  means  faithfulness  to  law,  is  used  as  if  it  were  only  the 
duty  of  a  people  to  be  loyal  to  their  king,  and  not  the  duty  of 
a  king  to  be  infinitely  more  loyal  to  his  people.  How  comes 
it  to  pass  that  a  captain  will  die  with  his  passengers,  and  lean 
over  the  gunwale  to  give  the  parting  boat  its  course  ;  but  that 
a  king  will  not  usually  die  with,  much  less  for,  his  passengers, 
— thinks  it  rather  incumbent  on  his  passengers,  in  any  nura- 
ber,  to  die  for  him  ?  Think,  I  beseech  you,  of  the  wonder  of 
this.  The  sea  captain,  not  captain  by  divine  right,  but  only 
by  company's  appointment ; — not  a  man  of  royal  descent,  but 
only  a  plebeian  wTho  can  steer  ; — not  with  the  eyes  of  the  world 
upon  him,  but  with  feeble  chance,  depending  on  one  poor 
boat,  of  his  name  being  ever  heard  above  the  wash  of  the  fatal 
waves  ; — not  with  the  cause  of  a  nation  resting  on  his  act,  but 
helpless  to  save  so  much  as  a  child  from  among  the  lost  crowd 


WAR. 


81 


with  whom  ne  resolves  to  be  lost, — yet  goes  down  quietly  to 
his  grave,  rather  than  break  his  faith  to  these  few  emigrants. 
But  your  captain  by  divine  right, — your  captain  with  the  hues 
of  a  hundred  shields  of  kings  upon  his  breast, — your  captain 
whose  every  deed,  brave  or  base,  will  be  illuminated  or 
branded  for  ever  before  unescapable  eyes  of  men, — your  cap- 
tain whose  every  thought  and  act  are  beneficent,  or  fatal,  from 
bunrislng  to  setting,  blessing  as  the  sunshine,  or  shadowing 
as  the  night, — this  captain,  as  you  find  him  in  history,  for  the 
most  part  thinks  only  how  he  may  tax  his  passengers,  and 
sit  at  most  ease  in  his  state  cabin  ! 

For  observe,  if  there  had  been  indeed  in  the  hearts  of  the 
rulers  of  great  multitudes  of  men  any  such  conception  of 
work  for  the  good  of  those  under  their  command,  as  there  m 
in  the  good  and  thoughtful  masters  of  any  small  company  ol 
men,  not  only  wars  for  the  sake  of  mere  increase  of  power 
could  never  take  place,  but  our  idea  of  power  itself  would  be 
entirely  altered.  Do  you  suppose  that  to  think  and  act  even 
for  a  million  of  men,  to  hear  their  complaints,  watch  their 
weaknesses,  restrain  their  vices,  make  laws  for  them,  lead 
ihem,  day  by  day,  to  purer  life,' is  not  enough  for  one  man's 
work  ?  If  any  of  us  were  absolute  lord  only  of  a  district  of 
a  hundred  miles  square,  and  were  resolved  on  doing  our  ut- 
most for  it ;  making  it  feed  as  large  a  number  of  people  as 
possible  ;  making  every  clod  productive,  and  every  rock  de- 
fensive, and  every  human  being  happy  ;  should  we  not  have 
enough  on  our  hands  think  you  ?  But  if  the  ruler  has  any 
other  aim  than  this  ;  if,  careless  of  the  result  of  his  interfer- 
ence, he  desire  only  the  authority  to  interfere  ;  and,  regard- 
less of  what  is  ill-done  or  well-done,  cares  only  that  it  shall 
be  done  at  his  bidding , — if  he  would  rather  do  two  hundred 
miles'  space  of  mischief,  than  one  hundred  miles'  space  of 
good,  of  course  he  will  try  to  add  to  his  territory  ;  and  to  add 
inimitably.  But  does  he  add  to  his  power  ?  Do  you  call  it 
power  in  a  child,  if  he  is  allowed  to  play  with  the  wheels  and 
bands  of  some  vast  engine,  pleased  wdth  their  murmur  and 
whirl,  till  his  unwise  touch,  wandering  where  it  ought  noi 
scatters  beam  and  wheel  into  ruin  ?    Yet  wThat  machine  is  so 


82 


THE  CRO  WN  OF  WILD  OLIVE. 


vast,  so  incognisable,  as  the  working  of  the  mind  of  a  nation , 
what  child's  touch  so  wanton,  as  the  word  of  a  selfish  king  ? 
And  yet,  how  long  have  we  allowed  the  historian  to  speak  of 
the  extent  of  the  calamity  a  man  causes,  as  a  just  ground  for 
his  pride  ;  and  to  extol  him  as  the  greatest  prince,  who  is 
only  the  centre  of  the  widest  error.  Follow  out  this  thought 
by  yourselves  :  and  you  will  find  that  all  power,  properly  so 
called,  is  wise  and  benevolent.  There  may  be  capacity  in  a 
drifting  fire-ship  to  destroy  a  fleet  ;  there  may  be  venom 
enough  in  a  dead  body  to  infect  a  nation  : — but  which  of  you, 
the  most  ambitious,  would  desire  a  drifting  kinghood,  robed 
in  consuming  fire,  or  a  poison-dipped  sceptre  whose  touch 
was  mortal  ?  There  is  no  true  potency,  remember,  but  that  of 
help  ;  nor  true  ambition,  but  ambition  to  save. 

And  then,  observe  farther,  this  true  power,  the  power  of 
saving,  depends  neither  on  multitude  of  men,  nor  on  extent 
of  territory.  We  are  continually  assuming  that  nations  be- 
come strong  according  to  their  numbers.  They  indeed  be- 
come so,  if  those  numbers  can  be  made  of  one  mind  ;  but 
how  are  you  sure  you  can  stay  them  in  one  mind,  and  keep 
them  from  having  north  and  south  minds?  Grant  them 
unanimous,  how  know  you  they  will  be  unanimous  in  right  ? 
If  they  are  unanimous  in  wrong,  the  more  they  are,  essentially 
the  weaker  they  are.  Or,  suppose  that  they  can  neither  be  of 
one  mind,  nor  of  two  minds,  but  can  only  be  of  no  mind  ? 
Suppose  they  are  a  mere  helpless  mob  ;  tottering  into  precipi- 
tant catastrophe,  like  a  waggon  load  of  stones  when  the  wheel 
comes  off.  Dangerous  enough  for  their  neighbours,  certainly, 
but  not  £  powerful.5 

Neither  does  strength  depend  on  extent  of  territory,  any 
more  than  upon  number  of  population.  Take  up  your  maps 
when  you  go  home  this  evening, — put  the  cluster  of  British 
Isles  beside  the  mass  of  South  America  ;  and  then  consider 
whether  any  race  of  men  need  care  how  much  ground  they 
stand  upon.  The  strength  is  in  the  men,  and  in  their  unity 
and  virtue,  not  in  their  standing  room  :  a  little  group  of  wise 
hearts  is  better  than  a  wilderness  full  of  fools  ;  and  only  thai 
nation  gains  true  territory,  which  gains  itself. 


WAR 


83 


And  now  for  the  brief  practical  outcome  of  all  this.  Re- 
member, no  government  is  ultimately  strong,  but  in  propor- 
tion to  its  kindness  and  justice  ;  and  that  a  nation  does  not 
strengthen,  by  merely  multiplying  and  diffusing  itself.  We 
have  not  strengthened  as  yet,  by  multiplying  into  America. 
Nay,  even  when  it  has  not  to  encounter  the  separating  condi 
tions  of  emigration,  a  nation  need  not  boast  itself  of  multiply- 
ing on  its  own  ground,  if  it  multiplies  only  as  flies  or  locusts 
do,  with  the  god  of  flies  for  its  god.  It  multiplies  its  strength 
only  by  increasing  as  one  great  family,  in  perfect  fellowship 
and  brotherhood.  And  lastly,  it  does  not  strengthen  itself 
by  seizing  dominion  over  races  whom  it  cannot  benefit.  Aus- 
tria is  not  strengthened,  but  weakened,  by  her  grasp  of  Lom- 
bardy ;  and  whatever  apparent  increase  of  majesty  and  of 
wealth  may  have  accrued  to  us  from  the  possession  of  India, 
whether  these  prove  to  us  ultimately  power  or  weakness,  de- 
pends wholly  on  the  degree  in  which  our  influence  on  the 
native  race  shall  be  benevolent  and  exalting.  But,  as  it  is  at 
their  own  peril  that  any  race  extends  their  dominion  in  mere 
desire  of  power,  so  it  is  at  their  own  still  greater  peril  that 
they  refuse  to  undertake  aggressive  war,  according  to  their 
force,  whenever  they  are  assured  that  their  authority  would 
be  helpful  and  protective.  Nor  need  you  listen  to  any  sophis- 
tical objection  of  the  impossibility  of  knowing  when  a  people's 
help  is  needed,  or  when  not.  Make  your  national  conscience 
clean,  and  your  national  eyes  will  soon  be  clear.  No  man 
who  is  truly  ready  to  take  part  in  a  noble  quarrel  will  ever 
stand  long  in  doubt  by  whom,  or  in  what  cause,  his  aid  is 
needed.  I  hold  it  my  duty  to  make  no  political  statement  of 
any  special  bearing  in  this  presence  ;  but  I  tell  you  broadly 
and  boldly,  that,  within  these  last  ten  years,  we  English  have, 
as  a  knightly  nation,  lost  our  spurs :  we  have  fought  where 
we  should  not  have  fought,  for  gain  ;  and  we  have  been  pas- 
sive where  we  should  not  have  been  passive,  for  fear.  I  tell 
you  that  the  principle  of  non-intervention,  as  now  preached 
among  us,  is  as  selfish  and  cruel  as  the  worst  frenzy  of  con- 
quest, and  differs  from  it  only  by  being  not  only  malignant, 
but  dastardly. 


84 


TEE  CROWN  OF  WILD  OLIVE. 


I  know,  however,  that  my  opinions  on  this  subject  differ  too 
widely  from  those  ordinarily  held,  to  be  any  farther  intruded 
upon  you  ;  and  therefore  I  pass  lastly  to  examine  the  condi- 
tions of  the  third  kind  of  noble  war  ; — war  waged  simply  for 
defence  of  the  country  in  which  wre  were  born,  and  for  the 
maintenance  and  execution  of  her  laws,  by  whomsoever  threat- 
ened or  defied.  It  is  to  this  duty  that  I  suppose  most  men 
entering  the  army  consider  themselves  in  reality  to  be  bound, 
and  I  want  you  now  to  reflect  what  the  laws  of  mere  defence 
are  ;  and  wThat  the  soldier's  duty,  as  now  understood,  or  sup- 
posed to  be  understood.  You  have  solemnly  devoted  your- 
selves to  be  English  soldiers,  for  the  guardianship  of  England. 
I  want  you  to  feel  what  this  vow  of  yours  indeed  means,  or  is 
gradually  coming  to  mean.  You  take  it  upon  you,  first,  while 
you  are  sentimental  schoolboys  ;  you  go  into  your  military 
convent,  or  barracks,  just  as  a  girl  goes  into  her  convent  while 
she  is  a  sentimental  schoolgirl ;  neither  of  you  then  know 
what  you  are  about,  though  both  the  good  soldiers  and  good 
nuns  make  the  best  of  it  afterwards.  You  don't  understand 
perhaps  why  I  call  you  c  sentimental 9  schoolboys,  when  you 
go  into  the  army  ?  Because,  on  the  whole,  it  is  love  of  adven- 
ture, of  excitement,  of  fine  dress  and  of  the  pride  of  fame,  all 
which  are  sentimental  motives,  which  chiefly  make  a  boy  like 
going  into  the  Guards  better  than  into  a  counting-house. 
You  fancy,  perhaps,  that  there  is  a  severe  sense  of  duty  mixed 
with  these  peacocky  motives  ?  And  in  the  best  of  you,  there 
is  ;  but  do  not  think  that  it  is  principal.  If  you  cared  to  do 
your  duty  to  your  country  in  a  prosaic  and  unsentimental 
way,  depend  upon  it,  there  is  now  truer  duty  to  be  done  in 
raising  harvests  than  in  burning  them  ;  more  in  building 
houses,  than  in  shelling  them — more  in  winning  money  by 
your  -own  work,  wherewith  to  help  men,  than  in  taxing  other 
people's  work,  for  money  wherewith  to  slay  men  ;  more  duty 
finally,  in  honest  and  unselfish  living  than  in  honest  and  un- 
selfish dying,  though  that  seems  to  your  boys'  eyes  the  brav- 
est. So  far  then,  as  for  your  own  honour,  and  the  honour  of 
your  families,  you  choose  brave  death  in  a  red  coat  before 
brave  life  in  a  black  one,  you  are  sentimental ;  and  now  see 


WAR. 


85 


what  this  passionate  vow  of  yours  comes  to.  For  a  little 
while  you  ride,  and  you  hunt  tigers  or  savages,  you  shoot,  and 
are  shot ;  you  are  happy,  and  proud,  always,  and  honoured 
and  wept  if  you  die  ;  and  you  are  satisfied  with  your  life,  and 
with  the  end  of  it ;  believing,  on  the  whole,  that  good  rather 
than  harm  of  it  comes  to  others,  and  much  pleasure  to  3-011. 
But  as  the  sense  of  duty  enters  into  your  forming  minds,  the 
vow  takes  another  aspect.  You  find  that  you  have  put  your- 
selves into  the  hand  of  your  country  as  a  weapon.  You  have 
vowed  to  strike,  when  she  bids  you,  and  to  stay  scabbarded 
when  she  bids  you  ;  all  that  you  need  answer  for  is,  that  you 
fail  not  in  her  grasp.  And  there  is  goodness  in  this,  and 
greatness,  if  you  can  trust  the  hand  and  heart  of  the  Brito- 
mart  who  has  braced  you  to  her  side,  and  are  assured  that 
when  she  leaves  you  sheathed  in  darkness,  there  is  no  need 
for  your  flash  to  the  sun.  But  remember,  good  and  noble  as 
this  state  may  be,  it  is  a  state  of  slavery.  There  are  different 
kinds  of  slaves  and  different  masters.  Some  slaves  are 
scourged  to  their  work  by  wThips,  others  are  scourged  to  it  by 
restlessness  or  ambition.  It  does  not  matter  what  the  whip 
is  ;  it  is  none  the  less  a  whip,  because  you  have  cut  thongs 
for  it  out  of  your  own  souls  :  the  fact,  so  far,  of  slavery,  is  in 
being  driven  to  your  work  without  thought,  at  another's  bid- 
ding. Again,  some  slaves  are  bought  with  money,  and  others 
with  praise.  It  matters  not  what  the  purchase-money  is. 
The  distinguishing  sign  of  slavery  is  to  have  a  price,  and  be 
bought  for  it.  Again,  it  matters  not  what  kind  of  work  you 
are  set  on  ;  some  slaves  are  set  to  forced  diggings,  others  to 
forced  marches ;  some  dig  furrows,  others  field-works,  and 
others  graves.  Some  press  the  juice  of  reeds,  and  some  the 
juice  of  vines,  and  some  the  blood  of  men.  The  fact  of  the 
captivity  is  the  same  whatever  work  we  are  set  upon,  though 
the  fruits  of  the  toil  may  be  different.  But,  remember,  in 
thus  vowing  ourselves  to  be  the  slaves  of  any  master,  it  ought 
to  be  some  subject  of  forethought  with  us,  what  work  he  is 
likely  to  put  us  upon.  You  may  think  that  the  whole  duty 
of  a  soldier  is  to  be  passive,  that  it  is  the  country  you  have  left 
behind  who  is  to  command,  and  you  have  only  to  obey.  But 


66 


THE  CROWN  OF  WILD  OLIVE. 


are  you  sure  that  you  have  left;  all  your  country  behind,  01 
that  the  part  of  it  you  have  so  left  is  indeed  the  best  part  of 
it?  Suppose — and,  remember,  it  is  quite  conceivable — that 
you  yourselves  are  indeed  the  best  part  of  England  ;  that  you, 
who  have  become  the  slaves,  ought  to  have  been  the  masters ; 
and  that  those  who  are  the  masters,  ought  to  have  been  the 
slaves !  If  it  is  a  noble  and  whole-hearted  England,  whose 
bidding  you  are  bound  to  do,  it  is  well ;  but  if  you  are  your- 
selves the  best  of  her  heart,  and  the  England  you  have  left  be 
but  a  half-hearted  England,  how  say  you  of  your  obedience  ? 
You  were  too  proud  to  become  shopkeepers  :  are  you  satisfied 
then  to  become  the  servants  of  shopkeepers  ?  You  were  too 
proud  to  become  merchants  or  farmers  yourselves  :  will  you 
have  merchants  or  farmers  then  for  your  field  marshals  ?  You 
had  no  gifts  of  special  grace  for  Exeter  Hall :  will  you  have 
some  gifted  person  thereat  for  your  commander-in-chief,  to 
judge  of  your  work,  and  reward  it?  You  imagine  yourselves 
to  be  the  army  of  England  :  how  if  you  should  find  yourselves, 
at  last,  only  the  police  of  her  manufacturing  towns,  and  the 
beadles  of  her  little  Bethels  ? 

It  is  not  so  yet,  nor  will  be  so,  I  trust,  for  ever  ;  but  what 
I  want  you  to  see,  and  to  be  assured  of,  is,  that  the  ideal  of 
soldiership  is  not  mere  passive  obedience  and  bravery ;  that, 
so  far  from  this,  no  country  is  in  a  healthy  state  which  has 
separated,  even  in  a  small  degree,  her  civil  from  her  military 
power.  All  states  of  the  world,  however  great,  fall  at  once 
when  they  use  mercenary  armies  ;  and  although  it  is  a  less  in- 
stant form  of  error  (because  involving  no  national  taint  of 
cowardice),  it  is  yet  an  error  no  less  ultimately  fatal — it  is  the 
error  especially  of  modern  times,  of  which  we  cannot  yet 
know  all  the  calamitous  consequences — to  take  away  the  best 
blood  and  strength  of  the  nation,  all  the  soul- substance  of  it 
that  is  brave,  and  careless  of  rewrard,  and  scornful  of  pain,  and 
faithful  in  trust ;  and  to  cast  that  into  steel,  and  make  a  mere 
sword  of  it  ;  taking  away  its  voice  and  will ;  but  to  keep  the 
worst  part  of  the  nation — whatever  is  cowardly,  avaricious, 
sensual,  and  faithless— and  to  give  to  this  the  voice,  to  this 
the  authority,  to  this  the  chief  privilege,  where  there  is  least 


WAR 


61 


capacity,  of  thought.  The  fulfilment  of  your  vow  for  the  de- 
fence of  England  will  by  no  means  consist  in  carrying  out 
such  a  system.  You  are  not  true  soldiers,  if  you  only  mean 
to  stand  at  a  shop  door,  to  protect  shop-boys  who  are  cheating 
inside.  A  soldier's  vow  to  his  country  is  that  he  will  die  for 
the  guardianship  of  her  domestic  virtue,  of  her  righteous  laws, 
and  of  her  anyway  challenged  or  endangered  honour.  A 
state  without  virtue,  without  laws,  and  without  honour,  he 
is  bound  not  to  defend  ;  nay,  bound  to  redress  by  his  own 
right  hand  that  which  he  sees  to  be  base  in  her.  So  sternly 
is  this  the  law  of  Nature  and  life,  that  a  nation  once  utterly 
corrupt  can  only  be  redeemed  by  a  military  despotism — never 
by  talking,  nor  by  its  free  effort.  And  the  health  of  any  state 
consists  simply  in  this  :  that  in  it,  those  who  are  wisest  shall 
also  be  strongest ;  its  rulers  should  be  also  its  soldiers  ;  or, 
rather,  by  force  of  intellect  more  than  of  sword,  its  soldiers 
its  rulers.  Whatever  the  hold  which  the  aristocracy  of  Eng- 
land has  on  the  heart  of  England,  in  that  they  are  still  always 
in  front  of  her  battles,  this  hold  will  not  be  enough,  unless 
they  are  also  in  front  of  her  thoughts.  And  truly  her  thoughts 
need  good  captain's  leading  now,  if  ever  !  Do  you  know  what, 
by  this  beautiful  division  of  labour  (her  brave  men  fighting, 
and  her  cowards  thinking),  she  has  come  at  last  to  think? 
Here  is  a  bit  of  paper  in  my  hand,*  a  good  one  too,  and  an 
honest  one  ;  quite  representative  of  the  best  common  public 
thought  of  England  at  this  moment ;  and  it  is  holding  forth  % 

*  I  do  not  care  to  refer  to  the  journal  quoted,  because  the  article  was 
unworthy  of  its  general  tone,  though  in  order  to  enable  the  audience  to 
verify  the  quoted  sentence,  I  left  the  number  containing  it  on  the  table, 
when  I  delivered  this  lecture.  But  a  saying  of  Baron  Liebig's,  quoted  at 
the  head  of  a  leader  on  the  same  subject  in  the  4  Daily  Telegraph  *  of  Jan- 
uary 11,  1866,  summarily  digests  and  presents  the  maximum  folly  of 
modern  thought  in  this  respect.  '  Civilization,'  says  the  Baron,  '  is  the 
economy  of  power,  and  English  power  is  coal.'  Not  altogether  so,  my 
chemical  friend.  Civilization  is  the  making  of  civil  persons,  which  is  a 
kind  of  distillation  of  which  alembics  are  incapable,  and  does  not  at  all 
imply  the  turning  of  a  small  company  of  gentlemen  into  a  large  company 
of  ironmongers.  And  English  power  (what  little  of  it  may  be  left),  is  by 
no  means  coal,  but,  indeed,  of  that  which,  1  when  the  whole  world  turns 
to  coal,  then  chiefly  lives.'  /" 


88 


THE  CNOWJT  OF  WILD  OLIVE. 


in  one  of  its  leaders  upon  our  Social  welfare/ — upon  ouf 
1  vivid  life  ' — upon  the  '  political  supremacy  of  Great  Britainc1 
And  what  do  you  think  all  these  are  owing  to  ?  To  what  our 
English  sires  have  done  for  us,  and  taught  us,  age  after  age? 
No  : .  not  to  that.  To  our  honesty  of  heart,  or  coolness  of  head, 
or  steadiness  of  will?  No:  not  to  these.  To  our  thinkers,  or 
our  statesmen,  or  our  poets,  or  our  captains,  or  our  martyrs, 
or  the  patient  labour  of  our  poor  ?  No  :  not  to  these  ;  or  at 
least  not  to  these  in  any  chief  measure.  Nay,  says  the  journal, 
■  more  than  any  agency,  it  is  the  cheapness  and  abundance  of 
our  coal  which  have  made  us  what  we  are.'  If  it  be  so,  then 
'  ashes  to  ashes  '  be  our  epitaph  !  and  the  sooner  the  better. 
I  tell  you,  gentlemen  of  England,  if  ever  you  would  have  your 
country  breathe  the  pure  breath  of  heaven  again,  and  receive 
again  a  soul  into  her  body,  instead  of  rotting  into  a  carcase, 
blown  up  in  the  belly  with  carbonic  acid  (and  great  that  way), 
you  must  think,  and  feel,  for  your  England,  as  well  as  fight 
for  her :  you  must  teach  her  that  all  the  true  greatness  she 
ever  had,  or  ever  can  have,  she  won  while  her  fields  were  green 
and  her  faces  ruddy  ; — that  greatness  is  still  possible  for  Eng- 
lishmen, even  though  the  ground  be  not  hollow  under  their 
feet,  nor  the  sky  black  over  their  heads  ; — and  that,  when  the 
day  comes  for  their  country  to  lay  her  honours  in  the  dust,  her 
crest  will  not  rise  from  it  more  loftily  because  it  is  dust  of 
goal.  Gentlemen,  I  tell  you,  solemnly,  that  the  day  is  coming 
when  the  soldiers  of  England  must  be  her  tutors  and  the  cap- 
tains of  her  army,  captains  also  of  her  mind. 

And  now,  remember,  you  soldier  youths,  who  are  thus  in 
all  ways  the  hope  of  your  country  ;  or  must  be,  if  she  have 
any  hope  :  remember  that  your  fitness  for  all  future  trust  de- 
pends upon  wrhat  you  are  now.  No  good  soldier  in  his  old 
age  was  ever  careless  or  indolent  in  his  youth.  Many  a  giddy 
and  thoughtless  boy  has  become  a  good  bishop,  or  a  good 
lawyer,  or  a  good  merchant ;  but  no  such  an  one  ever  be- 
came a  good  general.  I  challenge  you,  in  all  history,  to  find 
a  record  of  a  good  soldier  who  was  not  grave  and  earnest  in 
his  youth.  And,  in  general,  I  have  no  patience  with  people 
who  talk  about  '  the  thoughtlessness  of  youth '  indulgently, 


WAR 


80 


i  had  infinitely  rather  hear  of  thoughtless  old  age,  and  the  in- 
dulgence due  to  that.  When  a  man  has  done  his  work,  and 
nothing  can  any  way  be  materially  altered  in  his  fate,  let  him 
forget  his  toil,  and  jest  with  his  fate,  if  he  will ;  but  what 
excuse  can  you  find  for  wilfulness  of  thought,  at  the  very 
time  when  every  crisis  of  future  fortune  hangs  on  your  de- 
cisions? A  youth  thoughtless  !  when  all  the  happiness  of  his 
home  for  ever  depends  on  the  chances,  or  the  passions,  of  an 
hour  !  A  youth  thoughtless  !  when  the  career  of  all  his  days 
depends  on  the  opportunity  of  a  moment !  A  youth  thought- 
less !  when  his  every  act  is  a  foundation-stone  of  future  con- 
duct, and  every  imagination  a  fountain  of  life  or  death  !  Be 
thoughtless  in  any  after  years,  rather  than  now — though,  in- 
deed, there  is  only  one  place  where  a  man  may  be  nobly 
thoughtless, — his  deathbed.  No  thinking  should  ever  be 
left  to  be  done  there. 

Having,  then,  resolved  that  you  will  not  waste  recklessly, 
but  earnestly  use,  these  early  days  of  yours,  remember  that 
all  the  duties  of  her  children  to  England  maybe  summed  in 
two  words — industry,  and  honour.  I  say  first,  industry,  for 
it  is  in  this  that  soldier  youth  are  especially  tempted  to  fail. 
Yet  surely,  there  is  no  reason  because  your  life  may  possibly 
or  probably  be  shorter  than  other  men's,  that  you  should 
therefore  waste  more  recklessly  the  portion  of  it  that  is 
granted  you  ;  neither  do  the  duties  of  your  profession,  which 
require  you  to  keep  your  bodies  strong,  in  any  wise  involve 
the  keeping  of  your  minds  wreak.  So  far  from  that,  the  ex- 
perience, the  hardship,  and  the  activity  of  a  soldier's  life  ren- 
der his  powers  of  thought  more  accurate  than  those  of  other 
men  ;  and  while,  for  others,  all  knowledge  is  often  little  more 
than  a  means  of  amusement,  there  is  no  form  of  science 
which  a  soldier  may  not  at  some  time  or  other  find  bearing 
on  business  of  life  and  death.  A  young  mathematician  may 
be  excused  for  langour  in  shelving  curves  to  be  described 
only  with  a  pencil  ;  but  not  in  tracing  those  which  are  to  be 
described  with  a  rocket.  Your  knowledge  of  a  wholesome 
herb  may  involve  the  feeding  of  an  army  ;  and  acquaintance 
with  an  obscure  point  of  geography,  the  success  of  a  cam 


90 


THE  CROWN  OF  WILD  OLIVE. 


paign.  Never  waste  an  instant's  time,  therefore  ;  the  sin  c3 
idleness  is  a  thousandfold  greater  in  you  than  in  other 
youths ;  for  the  fates  of  those  who  will  one  day  be  under 
your  command  hang  upon  your  knowledge  ;  lost  moments 
now  will  be  lost  lives  then,  and  every  instant  which  you  care- 
lessly take  for  play,  you  buy  with  blood.  But  there  is  one 
way  of  wasting  time,  of  ail  the  vilest,  because  it  wastes,  not 
lime  only,  but  the  interest  and  energy  of  your  minds.  Of  all 
the  un gentlemanly  habits  into  which  you  can  fail,  the  vilest  is 
betting,  or  interesting  yourselves  in  the  issues  of  betting.  It 
unites  nearly  every  condition  of  folly  and  vice  ;  you  concen- 
trate your  interest  upon  a  matter  of  chance,  instead  of  upon  a 
subject  of  true  knowledge  ;  and  you  back  opinions  which  you 
have  no  grounds  for  forming,  merely  because  they  are  your 
own.  All  the  insolence  of  egotism  is  in  this  ;  and  so  far  as 
the  love  of  excitement  is  complicated  with  the  hope  of  win- 
ning money,  you  turn  yourselves  into  the  basest  sort  of  trades- 
men— those  who  live  by  speculation.  Were  there  no  other 
ground  for  industry,  this  would  be  a  sufficient  one  ;  that  it 
protected  you  from  the  temptation  to  so  scandalous  a  vice. 
Work  faithfully,  and  you  will  put  yourselves  in  possession  of 
a  glorious  and  enlarging  happiness  :  not  such  as  can  be  won 
by  the  speed  of  a  horse,  or  marred  by  the  obliquity  of  a  ball. 

First,  then,  by  industry  you  must  fulfil  your  vow  to  your 
country  ;  but  all  industry  and  earnestness  will  be  useless  un- 
less they  are  consecrated  by  your  resolution  to  be  in  all  things 
men  of  honour  ;  not  honour  in  the  common  sense  only,  but  in 
the  highest.  Rest  on  the  force  of  the  two  main  words  in  the 
great  verse,  integer  vitae,  scelerisque  pur  us.  You  have  vowed 
your  life  to  England  ;  give  it  her  wholly — a  bright,  stainless, 
perfect  life — a  knightly  life.  Because  you  have  to  fight  with 
machines  instead  of  lances,  there  may  be  a  necessity  for  more 
ghastly  danger,  but  there  is  none  for  less  worthiness  of  char- 
acter, than  in  olden  time.  You  may  be  true  knights  yet, 
though  perhaps  not  equites;  you  may  have  to  call  yourselvea 
'earmonry'  instead  of  *  chivalry,' but  that  is  no  reason  why 
you  should  not  call  yourselves  true  men.  So  the  firrst  thing 
you  have  to  see  to  in  becoming  soldiers  is  that  you  make  your- 


WAR. 


91 


selves  wholly  true.  Courage  is  a  mere  mattei  of  course  among 
any  ordinarily  well-born  youths  ;  but  neither  truth  nor  gentle- 
ness is  matter  of  course.  You  must  bind  them  like  shields 
about  your  necks  ;  you  must  write  them  on  the  tables  of  your 
hearts.  Though  it  be  not  exacted  of  you,  yet  exact  it  of  your- 
selves, this  vow  of  stainless  truth.  Your  hearts  are,  if  you 
leave  them  unstirred,  as  tombs  in  w^hich  a  god  lies  buried. 
Vow  yourselves  crusaders  to  redeem  that  sacred  sepulchre. 
And  remember,  before  all  things — for  no  other  memory  will 
be  so  protective  of  you — that  the  highest  law  of  this  knightly 
trut'k  is  that  under  which  it  is  vowed  to  women.  Whomso- 
ever else  you  deceive,  whomsoever  you  injure,  whomsoever 
you  leave  unaided,  you  must  not  deceive,  nor  injure,  nor  leave 
unaided  according  to  your  power,  any  woman  of  whatever 
rank.  Believe  me,  every  virtue  of  the  higher  phases  of  manly 
character  begins  in  this ; — in  truth  and  modesty  before  the 
face  of  all  maidens  ;  in  truth  and  pity,  or  truth  and  reverence, 
to  all  womanhood. 

And  now  let  me  turn  for  a  moment  to  you, — wives  and 
maidens,  who  are  the  souls  of  soldiers  ;  to  you, — mothers, 
who  have  devoted  your  children  to  the  great  hierarchy  of  war. 
Let  me  ask  you  to  consider  what  part  you  have  to  take  for 
the  aid  of  those  who  love  you  ;  for  if  you  fail  in  your  part 
they  cannot  fulfil  theirs ;  such  absolute  helpmates  you  are 
that  *io  man  can  stand  without  that  help,  nor  labour  in  his 
own  strength. 

I  know  your  hearts,  and  that  the  truth  of  them  never  fails 
when  an  hour  of  trial  comes  which  you  recognise  for  such. 
But  you  know  not  when  the  hour  of  trial  first  finds  you,  nor 
when  it  verily  finds  you.  You  imagine  that  you  are  only 
called  upon  to  wait  and  to  suffer  ;  to  surrender  and  to  mourn. 
You  know  that  }^ou  must  not  weaken  the  hearts  of  your  hus- 
bands and  lovers,  even  by  the  one  fear  of  which  those  hearts 
are  capable, — the  fear  of  parting  from  you,  or  of  causing  you 
grief.  Through  weary  years  of  separation,  through  fearful 
expectancies  of  unknown  fate  ;  through  the  tenfold  bitterness 
of  the  sorrow  which  might  so  easily  have  been  joy,  and  the 
tenfold  yearning  for  glorious  life  struck  down  in  its  prime— 


92 


THE  CROWN  OF  WILD  OLIVE. 


through  all  these  agonies  you  fail  not,  and  never  will  fail. 
But  your  trial  is  not  in  these.    To  be  heroic  in  danger  is  little  ; 

 you  are  Englishwomen.    To  be  heroic  in  change  and  sway  of 

fortune  is  little  ; — for  do  you  not  love  ?  To  be  patient  through 
the  great  chasm  and  pause  of  loss  is  little  ; — for  do  you  not 
still  love  in  heaven  ?  But  to  be  heroic  in  happiness  ;  to  bear 
yourselves  gravely  and  righteously  in  the  dazzling  of  the  sun- 
shine of  morning  ;  not  to  forget  the  God  in  whom  you  trust, 
when  He  gives  you  most ;  not  to  fail  those  who  trust  you, 
when  they  seem  to  need  you  least ;  this  is  the  difficult  forti- 
tude. It  is  not  in  the  pining  of  absence,  not  in  the  peril  of 
battle,  not  in  the  wasting  of  sickness,  that  your  pt&yer  should 
be  most  passionate,  or  3'our  guardianship  most  tender.  Pray, 
mothers  and  maidens,  for  your  young  soldiers  in  the  bloom  of 
their  pride  ;  pray  for  them,  while  the  only  dangers  round 
them  are  in  their  own  wayward  wills  ;  watch  you,  and  pray, 
when  they  have  to  face,  not  death,  but  temptation.  But  it 
is  this  fortitude  also  for  which  there  is  the  crowning  reward. 
Believe  me,  the  whole  course  and  character  of  your  lovers'  lives 
is  in  your  hands  ;  what  you  would  have  them  be,  they  shall  be, 
if  you  not  only  desire  to  have  them  so,  but  deserve  to  have 
them  so  ;  for  they  are  but  mirrors  in  which  you  will  see  your- 
selves imaged.  If  you  are  frivolous,  they  will  be  so  also  ;  if 
you  have  no  understanding  of  the  scope  of  their  duty,  they  also 
will  forget  it  ;  they  will  listen, — they  can  listen, — to  no  other 
interpretation  of  it  than  that  uttered  from  your  lips.  Bid 
them  be  brave  ; — they  will  be  brave  for  you  ;  bid  them  be 
cowards  ;  and  how  noble  soever  they  be  ; — they  will  quail  for 
you.  Bid  them  be  wise,  and  they  will  be  wise  for  you  ;  mock 
at  their  counsel,  they  will  be  fools  for  you  :  such  and  so  ab- 
solute is  your  rule  over  them.  You  fancy,  perhaps,  as  you 
have  been  told  so  often,  that  a  wife's  rule  should  only  be  over 
her  husbands  house,  not  over  his  mind.  Ah,  no !  the  true 
rule  is  just  the  reverse  of  that ;  a  true  wife,  in  her  husbands 
house,  is  his  servant ;  it  is  in  his  heart  that  she  is  queen. 
Whatever  of  the  best  he  can  conceive,  it  is  her  part  to  be  ; 
whatever  of  highest  he  can  hope,  it  is  hers  to  promise  ;  all 
that  is  dark  in  him  she  must  purge  into  purity ;  all  that  is  fail- 


WAR. 


93 


ing  in  him  she  must  strengthen  into  truth  :  from  her,  through 
all  the  world  s  clamour,  he  must  win  his  praise  ;  in  her,  through 
all  the  world's  warfare,  he  must  find  his  peace. 

And,  now,  but  one  word  more.  You  may  wonder,  perhaps, 
that  I  have  spoken  all  this  night  in  praise  of  war.  Yet,  truly, 
if  it  might  be,  I,  for  one,  would  fain  join  in  the  cadence 
of  hammer-strokes  that  should  beat  swords  into  plough- 
shares :  and  that  this  cannot  be,  is  not  the  fault  of  us  men. 
It  is  your  fault.  Wholly  yours.  Only  by  your  command, 
or  by  your  permission,  can  any  contest  take  place  among  us. 
And  the  real,  final,  reason  for  all  the  poverty,  misery,  and 
rage  of  battle,  throughout  Europe,  is  simply  that  you  women, 
however  good,  however  religious,  however  self-sacrificing  for 
those  whom  you  love,  are  too  selfish  and  too  thoughtless  to 
take  pains  for  any  creature  out  of  your  own  immediate  circles. 
You  fancy  that  you  are  sorry  for  the  pain  of  others.  Now  I 
just  tell  you  this,  that  if  the  usual  course  of  war,  instead  of 
unroofing  peasants'  houses,  and  ravaging  peasants5  fields, 
merely  broke  the  china  upon  your  own  drawing-room  tables, 
no  war  in  civilised  countries  would  last  a  week.  I  tell  you 
more,  that  at  whatever  moment  you  chose  to  put  a  period  to 
war,  you  could  do  it  with  less  trouble  than  you  take  any  dr.y 
to  go  out  to  dinner.  You  know,  or  at  least  you  might  know  if 
you  would  think,  that  every  battle  you  hear  of  has  made  many 
widows  and  orphans.  We  have,  none  of  us,  heart  enough 
truly  to  mourn  with  these.  But  at  least  we  might  put  on  the 
outer  symbols  of  mourning  with  them.  Let  but  every  Chris- 
tian lady  who  has  conscience  toward  God,  vow  that  she  will 
mourn,  at  least  outwardly,  for  His  killed  creatures.  Your 
praying  is  useless,  and  your  churchgoing  mere  mockery  of 
God,  if  you  have  not  plain  obedience  in  you  enough  for  this. 
Let  every  lady  in  the  upper  classes  of  civilised  Europe  simpljj 
vow  that,  while  any  cruel  war  proceeds,  she  will  wear  black  ; — 
a  mute's  black, — with  no  jewel,  no  ornament,  no  excuse  for,  or 
evasion  into,  prettiness. — I  tell  you  again,  no  war  would  last  a 
.week. 

And  lastly.  You  women  of  England  are  all  now  shrieking 
with  one  voice,  -  you  and  your  clergymen  together, — because 


84:  THE  CROWN  OF  WILD  OLIVE. 

you  hear  of  your  Bibles  being  attacked.  If  you  choose  ta 
obey  your  Bibles,  you  will  never  care  who  attacks  them.  It 
is  just  because  you  never  fulfil  a  single  downright  precept  of 
the  Book,  that  you  are  so  careful  for  its  credit :  and  just  be- 
cause you  don't  care  to  obey  its  whole  words,  that  you  are 
so  particular  about  the  letters  of  them.  The  Bible  tells  you 
to  dress  plainly, — and  you  are  mad  for  finery  ;  the  Bible  tells 
you  to  have  pity  on  the  poor, — and  you  crush  them  under  your 
carriage-wheels  ;  the  Bible  tells  you  to  do  judgment  and  jus- 
tice,— and  you  do  not  know,  nor  care  to  know,  so  much  as 
what  the  Bible  word  'justice  means.'  Do  but  learn  so  much 
of  God's  truth  as  that  comes  to  ;  know  what  He  means  when 
He  tells  you  to  be  just :  and  teach  your  sons,  that  their 
bravery  is  but  a  fool's  boast,  and  their  deeds  but  a  firebrand's 
tossing,  unless  they  are  indeed  Just  men,  and  Perfect  in  the 
Pear  of  God  ; — and  you  will  soon  have  no  more  war,  unless 
it  be  indeed  such  as  is  willed  by  Him,  of  whom,  though 
Prince  of  Peace,  it  is  also  written,  *  In  Righteousness  He  doth 
judge,  and  make  war.' 


M  UN  ERA  PULVERIS 

SIX  ESSAYS 
ON  THE  ELEMENTS  OF 

POLITICAL  ECONOMY 


PEE  FACE. 


The  following  pages  contain,  I  believe,  the  first  accurate 
analysis  of  the  laws  of  Political  Economy  which  has  been 
published  in  England.  Many  treatises,  within  their  scope, 
correct,  have  appeared  in  contradiction  of  the  views  popu- 
larly received  ;  but  no  exhaustive  examination  of  the  subject 
was  possible  to  any  person  unacquainted  with  the  value  of 
the  products  of  the  highest  industries,  commonly  called  the 
"  Fine  Arts  ; "  and  no  one  acquainted  with  the  nature  of 
those  industries  has,  so  far  as  I  know,  attempted,  or  even  ap- 
proached, the  task. 

So  that,  to  the  date  (1863)  when  these  Essays  were  pub- 
lished, not  only  the  chief  conditions  of  the  production  of 
wealth  had  remained  unstated,  but  the  nature  of  wrealth  itself 
had  never  been  defined.  "Every  one  has  a  notion,  sufficiently 
correct  for  common  purposes,  of  what  is  meant  by  wealth, " 
wrote  Mr.  Mill,  in  the  outset  of  his  treatise  ;  and  contentedly 
proceeded,  as  if  a  chemist  should  proceed  to  investigate  the 
laws  of  chemistry  without  endeavouring  to  ascertain  the  nat- 
ure of  fire  or  water,  because  every  one  had  a  notion  of  them, 
"  sufficiently  correct  for  common  purposes." 

But  even  that  apparently  indisputable  statement  was  un- 
true. There  is  not  one  person  in  ten  thousand  who  has  a 
notion  sufficiently  correct,  even  for  the  commonest  purposes, 
of  "  what  is  meant  "  by  wealth ;  still  less  of  what  wealth  ever- 
lastingly is,  whether  we  mean  it  or  not ;  which  it  is  the  busi- 
ness of  every  student  of  economy  to  ascertain.  We,  indeed, 
know  (either  by  experience  or  in  imagination)  what  it  is  to  be 
able  to  provide  ourselves  wdth  luxurious  food,  and  handsome 
clothes ;  and  if  Mr.  Mill  had  thought  that  wealth  consisted 


93 


PREFACE. 


only  in  these,  or  in  the  means  of  obtaining  these,  it  would 
have  been  easy  for  him  to  have  so  defined  it  with  perfect 
scientific  accuracy.  But  he  knew  better  :  he  knew  that  some 
kinds  of  wealth  consisted  in  the  possession,  or  power  of  ob- 
taining, other  things  than  these  ;  but,  having,  in  the  studies 
of  his  life,  no  clue  to  the  principles  of  essential  value,  he  was 
compelled  to  take  public  opinion  as  the  ground  of  his  science ; 
and  the  public,  of  course,  willingly  accepted  the  notion  of  a 
science  founded  on  their  opinions. 

I  had,  on  the  contrary,  a  singular  advantage,  not  only  in 
the  greater  extent  of  the  field  of  investigation  opened  to  me 
by  my  daily  pursuits,  but  in  the  severity  of  some  lessons  I 
accidentally  received  in  the  course  of  them. 

When,  in  the  winter  of  1851,  I  was  collecting  materials  for 
my  work  on  Venetian  architecture,  three  of  the  pictures  of 
Tintoret  on  the  roof  of  the  School  of  St.  Eoch  were  hanging 
down  in  ragged  fragments,  mixed  with  lath  and  plaster,  round 
the  aperturejs  made  by  the  fall  of  three  Austrian  heavy  shot. 
The  city  of  Venice  was  not,  it  appeared,  rich  enough  to  repair 
the  damage  that  winter  ;  and  buckets  were  set  on  the  floor  of 
the  upper  room  of  the  school  to  catch  the  rain,  which  not 
only  fell  directly  through  the  shot  holes,  but  found  its  way, 
owing  to  the  generally  pervious  state  of  the  roof,  through 
many  of  the  canvases  of  Tintoret's  in  other  parts  of  the 
ceiling. 

It  was  a  lesson  to  me,  as  I  have  just  said,  no  less  direct 
than  severe  ;  for  I  knew  already  at  that  time  (though  I  have 
not  ventured  to  assert,  until  recently  at  Oxford,)  that  the  pict- 
ures of  Tintoret  in  Venice  were  accurately  the  most  precious 
articles  of  wealth  in  Europe,  being  the  best  existing  produc- 
tions of  human  industry.  Now  at  the  time  that  three  of  them 
were  thus  fluttering  in  moist  rags  from  the  roof  they  had 
adorned,  the  shops  of  the  Rue  Rivoli  at  Paris  were,  in  obe- 
dience to  a  steadily-increasing  public  Demand,  beginning  to 
show  a  steadily-increasing  Supply  of  elaborately-finished  and 
coloured  lithographs,  representing  the  modern  dances  of  de- 
light, among  which  the  cancan  has  since  taken  a  distinguished 
place. 


PREFACE. 


99 


The  labour  employed  on  the  stone  of  one  of  these  litho* 
graphs  is  very  much  more  than  Tintoret  was  in  the  habit  of 
giving  to  a  picture  of  average  size.  Considering  labour  as 
the  origin  of  value,  therefore,  the  stone  so  highly  wrought 
would  be  of  greater  value  than  the  picture  ;  and  since  also  it 
is  capable  of  producing  a  large  number  of  immediately  sale- 
able or  exchangeable  impressions,  for  which  the  "  demand  " 
is  constant,  the  city  of  Paris  naturally  supposed  itself,  and  on 
all*hitherto  believed  or  stated  principles  of  political  economy, 
was,  infinitely  richer  in  the  possession  of  a  large  number  of 
these  lithographic  stones,  (not  to  speak  of  countless  oil  pict- 
ures and  marble  carvings  of  similar  character),  than  Venice 
in  the  possession  of  those  rags  of  mildewed  canvas,  flaunting 
in  the  south  wind  and  its  salt  rain.  And,  accordingly,  Paris 
provided  (without  thought  of  the  expense)  lofty  arcades  of 
shops,  and  rich  recesses  of  innumerable  private  apartments, 
for  the  protection  of  these  better  treasures  of  hers  from  the 
weather. 

Yet,  all  the  while,  Paris  was  not  the  richer  for  these  pos- 
sessions. Intrinsically,  the  delightful  lithographs  were  not 
wealth,  but  polar  contraries  of  wealth.  She  was,  by  the  exact 
quantity  of  labour  she  had  given  to  produce  these,  sunk  be- 
low, instead  of  above,  absolute  Poverty.  They  not  only  were 
false  Riches — they  were  true  Debt,  which  had  to  be  paid  at 
last — and  the  present  aspect  of  the  Rue  Rivoli  shows  in  what 
manner. 

And  the  faded  stains  of  the  Venetian  ceiling,  all  the  while, 
were  absolute  and  inestimable  wealth.  Useless  to  their  pos- 
sessors as  forgotten  treasure  in  a  buried  city,  they  had  in 
them,  nevertheless,  the  intrinsic  and  eternal  nature  of  wTealth  ; 
and  Venice,  still  possessing  the  ruins  of  them,  was  a  rich  city ; 
only,  the  Venetians  had  not  a  notion  sufficiently  correct  even 
for  the  very  common  purpose  of  inducing  them  to  put  slates 
on  a  roof,  of  what  was  "meant  by  wealth." 

The  vulgar  economist  would  reply  that  his  science  had 
nothing  to  do  with  the  qualities  of  pictures,  but  with  their 
exchange-value  only  ;  and  that  his  business  was,  exclusively, 
to  consider  whether  the  remains  of  Tintoret  were  worth  as 


PREFACE. 


many  fen-and-sixpences  as  the  impressions  which  might  be 
taken  from  the  lithographic  stones. 

But  he  would  not  venture,  without  reserve,  to  make  such 
an  answer,  if  the  example  be  taken  in  horses,  instead  of  pict- 
ures. The  most  dull  economist  would  perceive,  and  admit, 
that  a  gentleman  who  had  a  fine  stud  of  horses  was  absolute- 
ly richer  than  one  who  had  only  ill-bred  and  broken-winded 
ones,  He  would  instinctively  feel,  though  his  pseudo-science 
had  never  taught  him,  that  the  price  paid  for  the  animals,  in 
either  case,  did  not  alter  the  fact  of  their  worth  :  that  the 
good  horse,  though  it  might  have  been  bought  by  chance  for 
a  few  guineas,  was  not  therefore  less  valuable,  nor  the  owner 
of  the  galled  jade  any  the  richer,  because  he  had  given  a  hun- 
dred for  it. 

So  that  the  economist,  in  saying  that  his  science  takes  no 
account  of  the  qualities  of  pictures,  merely  signifies  that  he 
cannot  conceive  of  any  quality  of  essential  badness  or  good- 
ness existing  in  pictures  ;  and  that  he  is  incapable  of  investi- 
gating the  laws  of  wealth  in  such  articles.  Which  is  the  fact. 
But,  being  incapable  of  defining  intrinsic  value  in  pictures,  it 
follows  that  he  must  be  equally  helpless  to  define  the  nature 
of  intrinsic  value  in  painted  glass,  or  in  painted  pottery,  or  in 
patterned  stuffs,  or  in  any  other  national  produce  requiring 
true  human  ingenuity.  Nay,  though  capable  of  conceiving 
the  idea  of  intrinsic  value  with  respect  to  beasts  of  burden, 
no  economist  has  endeavoured  to  state  the  general  princi- 
ples of  National  Economy,  even  with  regard  to  the  horse  or 
the  ass.  And,  in  fine,  the  modern  political  economists  have 
been,  ivithout  exception,  incapable  of  apprehending  the  nature  of 
intrinsic  value  at  all. 

And  the  first  specialty  of  the  following  treatise  consists  in 
its  giving  at  the  outset,  and  maintaining  as  the  foundation  of 
all  subsequent  reasoning,  a  definition  of  Intrinsic  Value,  and 
Intrinsic  Contrary-of- Value  ;  the  negative  power  having  been 
left  by  former  writers  entirely  out  of  account,  and  the  positive 
power  left  entirely  undefined. 

But,  secondly  :  the  modern  economist,  ignoring  intrinsic 
value,  and  accepting  the  popular  estimate  of  things  as  the 


PREFACE. 


101 


only  ground  of  his  science,  has  imagined  himself  to  have  as* 
certain ed  the  constant  laws  regulating  the  relation  of  this 
popular  demand  to  its  supply  ;  or,  at  least,  to  have  proved 
that  demand  and  supply  were  connected  by  heavenly  balance, 
over  which  human  foresight  had  no  power.  I  chanced,  by 
singular  coincidence,  lately  to  see  this  theory  of  the  law  of 
demand  and  supply  brought  to  as  sharp  practical  issue  in  an- 
other great  siege,  as  I  had  seen  the  theories  of  intrinsic  value 
brought,  in  the  siege  of  Venice. 

I  had  the  honour  of  being  on  the  committee  under  the 
presidentship  of  the  Lord  Mayor  of  London,  for  the  victual- 
ling of  Paris  after  her  surrender.  It  became,  at  one  period  of 
our  sittings,  a  question  of  vital  importance  at  what  moment 
the  law  of  demand  and  supply  would  come  into  operation,  and 
what  the  operation  of  it  would  exactly  be  :  the  demand,  on 
this  occasion,  being  very  urgent  indeed  ;  that  of  several  mill- 
ions of  people  within  a  few  hours  of  utter  starvation,  for  any 
kind  of  food  whatsoever.  Nevertheless,  it  was  admitted,  in 
the  course  of  debate,  to  be  probable  that  the  divine  principle 
of  demand  and  supply  might  find  itself  at  the  eleventh  hour, 
and  some  minutes  over,  in  want  of  carts  and  horses ;  and  we 
ventured  so  far  to  interfere  with  the  divine  principle  as  to 
provide  carts  and  horses,  with  haste  which  proved,  happily, 
in  time  for  the  need  ;  but  not  a  moment  in  advance  of  it  It 
was  farther  recognized  by  the  committee  that  the  divine  prin- 
ciple of  demand  and  supply  would  commence  its  operations 
by  charging  the  poor  of  Paris  twelve-pence  for  a  penny's 
worth  of  whatever  they  wanted  ;  and  would  end  its  operations 
by  offering  them  twelve-pence  worth  for  a  penny,  of  whatever 
they  didn't  want  Whereupon  it  wras  concluded  by  the  com- 
mittee that  the  tiny  knot,  on  this  special  occasion,  wras  scarcely 
"  dignus  vindice"  by  the  divine  principle  of  demand  and  sup- 
ply :  and  that  we  would  venture,  for  once,  in  a  profane  man- 
ner, to  provide  for  the  poor  of  Paris  what  they  wanted,  when 
they  wanted  it.  Which,  to  the^  value  of  the  sums  entrusted 
to  us,  it  will  be  remembered  we  succeeded  in  doing. 

But  the  fact  is  x,hat  the  so-called  "law,"  which  was  felt  to 
be  false  in  this  case  of  extreme  exigence,  is  alike  false  in  cases 


102 


PREFACE. 


of  less  exigence.  It  is  false  always,  and  everywhere.  Nay 
to  such  an  extent  is  its  existence  imaginary,  that  the  vulgar 
economists  are  not  even  agreed  in  their  account  of  it ;  for 
some  of  them  mean  by  it,  only  that  prices  are  regulated  by 
the  relation  between  demand  and  supply,  which  is  partly 
true  ;  and  others  mean  that  the  relation  itself  is  one  with  the 
process  of  which  it  is  unwise  to  interfere  ;  a  statement  which 
is  not  only,  as  in  the  above  instance,  untrue  ;  but  accurately 
the  reverse  of  the  truth :  for  all  wise  economy,  political  or 
domestic,  consists  in  the  resolved  maintenance  of  a  given  re- 
lation between  supply  and  demand,  other  than  the  instinctive, 
or  (directly)  natural,  one* 

Similarly,  vulgar  political  economy  asserts  for  a  "  law  "  that 
wrages  are  determined  by  competition. 

Now  I  pay  my  servants  exactly  what  wages  I  think  neces- 
sary to  make  them  comfortable.  The  sum  is  not  determined 
at  all  by  competition  ;  but  sometimes  by  my  notions  of  their 
comfort  and  deserving,  and  sometimes  by  theirs.  If  I  were 
to  become  penniless  to-morrow,  several  of  them  would  cer- 
tainly still  serve  me  for  nothing. 

In  both  the  real  and  supposed  cases  the  so-called  "  law  "  of 
vulgar  political  economy  is  absolutely  set  at  defiance.  But  I 
cannot  set  the  law  of  gravitation  at  defiance,  nor  determine 
that  in  my  house  I  will  not  allow  ice  to  melt,  when  the  tem- 
perature is  above  thirty-two  degrees.  A  true  law  outside  of 
my  house,  will  remain  a  true  one  inside  of  it.  It  is  not,  there- 
fore, a  law  of  Nature  that  wages  are  determined  by  competi- 
tion. Still  less  is  it  a  law  of  State,  or  we  should  not  now  be 
disputing  about  it  publicly,  to  the  loss  of  many  millions  of 
pounds  to  the  country.  The  fact  which  vulgar  economists 
have  been  weak  enough  to  imagine  a  law,  is  only  that,  for  the 
last  twenty  years  a  number  of  very  senseless  persons  have  at- 
tempted to  determine  wages  in  that  manner  ;  and  have,  in  a 
measure,  succeeded  in  occasionally  doing  so. 

Both  in  definition  of  the  elements  of  wealth,  and  in  state- 
ment of  the  laws  which  govern  its  distribution,  modern  politi- 
cal economy  has  been  thus  absolutely  incompetent,  or  abso- 
lutely false.    And  the  following  treatise  is  not,  as  it  has  been 


PREFACE. 


103 


asserted  with  dull  pertinacity,  an  endeavour  to  put  sentiment 
in  the  place  of  science  ;  but  it  contains  the  exposure  of  what 
insolently  pretended  to  be  a  science  ;  and  the  definition, 
hitherto  unassailed — and  I  do  not  fear  to  assert,  unassailable 
— of  the  material  elements  with  which  political  economy  has 
to  deal,  and  the  moral  principles  in  which  it  consists ;  being 
not  itself  a  science,  but  "  a  system  of  conduct  founded  on  the 
sciences,  and  impossible,  except  under  certain  conditions  of 
moral  culture."  "Which  is  only  to  say,  that  industry,  frugality, 
and  discretion,  the  three  foundations  of  economy,  are  moral 
qualities,  and  cannot  be  attained  without  moral  discipline  :  a 
flat  truism,  the  reader  may  think,  thus  stated,  yet  a  truism 
which  is  denied  both  vociferously,  and  in  all  endeavour,  by 
the  entire  populace  of  Europe  ;  who  are  at  present  hopeful  of 
obtaining  wealth  by  tricks  of  trade,  without  industry  ;  who, 
possessing  wealth,  have  lost  in  the  use  of  it  even  the  concep- 
tion,— how  much  more  the  habit  ? — of  frugality  ;  and  who,  in 
the  choice  of  the  elements  of  wealth,  cannot  so  much  as  lose 
— since  they  have  never  hitherto  at  any  time  possessed, — the 
faculty  of  discretion. 

Now  if  the  teachers  of  the  pseudo-science  of  economy  had 
ventured  to  state  distinctly  even  the  poor  conclusions  they 
had  reached  on  the  subjects  respecting  which  it  is  most  dan- 
gerous for  a  populace  to  be  indiscreet,  they  would  have  soon 
found,  by  the  use  made  of  them,  which  were  true,  and  which 
false. 

But  on  main  and  vital  questions,  no  political  economist  has 
hitherto  ventured  to  state  one  guiding  principle.  I  will  in- 
stance three  subjects  of  universal  importance.  National 
Dress.    National  Eent.    National  Debt. 

Now  if  we  are  to  look  in  any  quarter  for  a  systematic  and 
exhaustive  statement  of  the  principles  of  a  given  science,  it 
must  certainly  be  from  its  Professor  at  Cambridge. 

Take  the  last  edition  of  Professor  Fawcett's  Manual  of  Po- 
litical Economy,  and  forming,  first  clearly  in  your  mind  these 
three  following  questions,  see  if  you  can  find  an  answer  to 
them. 

I.  Does  expenditure  of  capital  on  the  production  of  luxu> 


101 


PREFACE. 


rious  dress  and  furniture  tend  to  make  a  nation  rich  or  poor? 

II.  Does  the  payment,  by  the  nation,  of  a  tax  on  its  land, 
or  on  the  produce  of  it,  to  a  certain  number  of  private  per- 
sons, to  be  expended  by  them  as  they  please,  tend  to  make 
the  nation  rich  or  poor  ? 

III.  Does  the  payment,  by  the .  nation,  for  an  indefinite 
period,  of  interest  on  money  borrowed  from  private  persons, 
tend  to  make  the  nation  rich  or  poor  ? 

These  three  questions  are,  all  of  them,  perfectly  simple, 
and  primarily  vital.  Determine  these,  and  you  have  at  once 
a  basis  for  national  conduct  in  all  important  particulars. 
Leave  them  undetermined,  and  there  is  no  limit  to  the  dis- 
tress which  may  be  brought  upon  the  people  by  the  cunning 
of  its  knaves,  and  the  folly  of  its  multitudes. 

I  will  take  the  three  in  their  order. 

I.  Dress.  The  general  impression  on  the  public  mind  at 
this  day  is,  that  the  luxury  of  the  rich  in  dress  and  furniture 
is  a  benefit  to  the  poor.  Probably  not  even  the  blindest  of 
our  political  economists  would  venture  to  assert  this  in  so 
many  words.  But  where  do  they  assert  the  contrary  ?  Dur- 
ing the  entire  period  of  the  reign  of  the  late  Emperor  it  was 
assumed  in  France,  as  the  first  principle  of  fiscal  government, 
that  a  large  portion  of  the  funds  received  as  rent  from  the 
provincial  labourer  should  be  expended  in  the  manufacture 
of  ladies'  dresses  in  Paris.  Where  is  the  political  economist 
in  France,  or  England,  who  ventured  to  assert  the  conclu- 
sions of  his  science  as  adverse  to  this  system  ?  As  early  as 
the  year  1857  I  had  done  my  best  to  show  the  nature  of  the 
error,  and  to  give  warning  of  its  danger  ;  *  but  not  one  of  the 
men  who  had  the  foolish  ears  of  the  people  intent  on  their 
words,  dared  to  follow  me  in  speaking  what  would  have  been 
an  offence  to  the  powers  of  trade  ;  and  the  powers  of  trade  in 
Paris  had  their  full  way  for  fourteen  years  more, — with  this 
result,  to-day, — as  told  us  in  precise  and  curt  terms  by  the 
Minister  of  Public  Instruction, — f 

*  Political  Economy  of  Art    (Smith  and  Elder,  1857,  pp.  65-76.) 

f  See  report  of  speech  of  M.  Jules  Simon,  in  Pall  Mall  Gazette  oi 
October  27,  1871. 


PREFACE. 


105 


<c  We  have  replaced  glory  by  gold,  work  by  speculation, 
!aith  and  honour  by  scepticism.  To  absolve  or  glorify  im- 
morality ;  to  make  much  of  loose  women  ;  to  gratify  our  eyes 
with  luxury,  our  ears  with  the  tales  of  orgies  ;  to  aid  in  the 
manoeuvres  of  public  robbers,  or  to  applaud  them  ;  to  laugh 
at  morality,  and  only  believe  in  success  ;  to  love  nothing  but 
pleasure,  adore  nothing  but  force  ;  to  replace  wrork  with  a 
fecundity  of  fancies ;  to  speak  without  thinking  ;  to  prefer 
noise  to  glory  ;  to  erect  sneering  into  a  system,  and  lying  into 
an  institution — is  this  the  spectacle  that  we  have  seen  ? — is 
this  the  society  that  we  have  been  ?  " 

Of  course,  other  causes,  besides  the  desire  of  luxury  in  fur- 
niture and  dress,  have  been  at  work  to  produce  such  conse- 
quences ;  but  the  most  active  cause  of  all  has  been  the  pas- 
sion for  these  ;  passion  unrebuked  by  the  clergy,  and,  for  the 
most  part,  provoked  by  economists,  as  advantageous  to  com- 
merce ;  nor  need  we  think  that  such  results  have  been  ar- 
rived at  in  France  only ;  we  are  ourselves  following  rapidly 
on  the  same  road.  France,  in  her  old  wars  with  us,  never 
was  so  fatally  our  enemy  as  she  has  been  in  the  fellowship  of 
fashion,  and  the  freedom  of  trade  :  nor,  to  my  mind,  is  any 
fact  recorded  of  Assyrian  or  Roman  luxury  more  ominous,  or 
ghastly,  than  one  which  came  to  my  knowledge  a  few  weeks 
ago,  in  England  ;  a  respectable  and  well-to-do  father  and 
mother,  in  a  quiet  north  country  town,  being  turned  into  the 
streets  in  their  old  age,  at  the  suit  of  their  only  daughter's 
milliner. 

II.  Rent.  The  following  account  of  the  real  nature  of  rent 
is  given,  quite  accurately,  by  Professor  Fawcett,  at  page  112 
of  the  last  edition  of  his  Political  Economy: — 

"Every  country  has  probably  been  subjugated,  and  grants 
of  vanquished  territory  were  the  ordinary  rewards  which  the 
conquering  chief  bestowed  upon  his  more  distinguished  fol- 
lowers. Lands  obtained  by  force  had  to  be  defended  by 
force  ;  and  before  law  had  asserted  her  supremacy,  and  prop- 
erty was  made  secure,  no  baron  was  able  to  retain  his  posses- 
sions, unless  those  who  lived  on  his  estates  were  prepared  to 


10G 


PREFACE. 


defend  them.  .  .  .*  As  property  became  secure,  and  lan<5* 
lords  felt  that  the  power  of  the  State  would  protect  them  in 
all  the  rights  of  property,  every  vestige  of  these  feudal  ten- 
ures was  abolished,  and  the  relation  between  landlord  and 
tenant  has  thus  become  purely  commercial.  A  landlord  offers 
his  land  to  any  one  who  is  willing  to  take  it ;  he  is  anxious  tc 
receive  the  highest  rent  he  can  obtain.  "What  are  the  prin 
ciples  which  regulate  the  rent  which  may  thus  be  paid  r " 

These  principles  the  Professor  goes  on  contentedly  to  in- 
vestigate,  never  appearing  to  contemplate  for  an  instant  the 
possibility  of  the  first  principle  in  the  whole  business — the 
maintenance,  by  force,  of  the  possession  of  land  obtained  by 
force,  being  ever  called  in  question  by  any  human  mind.  It 
is,  nevertheless,  the  nearest  task  of  our  day  to  discover  how 
far  original  theft  may  be  justly  encountered  by  reactionary 
theft,  or  whether  reactionary  theft  be  indeed  theft  at  all ;  and 
farther,  what,  excluding  either  original  or  corrective  theft,  are 
the  just  conditions  of  the  possession  of  land. 

HI.  Debt.  Long  since,  when,  a  mere  boy,  I  used  to  sit 
silently  listening  to  the  conversation  of  the  London  merchants 
who,  all  of  them  good  and  sound  men  of  business,  were  wont 
occasionally  to  meet  round  my  father's  dining-table  ;  nothing 
used  to  surprise  me  more  than  the  conviction  openly  expressed 
by  some  of  the  soundest  and  most  cautious  of  them,  that  "  if 
there  were  no  National  debt  they  would  not  know  what  to  do 
with  their  money,  or  where  to  place  it  safely."  At  the  399th 
page  of  his  Manual,  you  will  find  Professor  Fawcett  giving  ex- 
actly the  same  statement. 

"  In  our  own  country,  this  certainty  against  risk  of  loss  is 
provided  by  the  public  funds  ;  " 

and  again,  as  on  the  question  of  rent,  the  Professor  proceeds, 
without  appearing  for  an  instant  to  be  troubled  by  any  mis- 
giving that  there  may  be  an  essential  difference  between  the 
effects  on  national  prosperity  of  a  Government  paying  interest 

*  The  omitted  sentences  merely  amplify  the  statement ;  they  in  m 
frise  modify  it. 


I3  HE  FACE. 


107 


on  money  which  it  spent  in  fire  works  fifty  years  ago,  and  of  a 
Government  paying  interest  on  money  to  be  employed  to-day 
on  productive  labour. 

That  difference,  which  the  reader  will  find  stated  and  ex« 
amined  at  length,  in  §§  127-129  of  this  volume,  it  is  the  busi- 
ness of  economists,  before  approaching  any  other  question  re*, 
lating  to  government,  fully  to  explain.  And  the  paragraphs 
to  which  I  refer,  contain,  I  believe,  the  only  definite  statement 
of  it  hitherto  made. 

The  practical  result  of  the  absence  of  any  such  statement  is, 
that  capitalists,  when  they  do  not  know  what  to  do  with  their 
money,  persuade  the  peasants,  in  various  countries,  that  the 
said  peasants  want  guns  to  shoot  each  other  with.  The  peas- 
ants accordingly  borrow  guns,  out  of  the  manufacture  of  which 
the  capitalists  get  a  percentage,  and  men  of  science  much 
amusement  and  credit.  Then  the  peasants  shoot  a  certain 
number  of  each  other,  until  they  get  tired ;  and  burn  each 
other's  homes  down  in  various  places.  Then  they  put  the 
guns  back  into  towers,  arsenals,  &c,  in  ornamental  patterns  ; 
(and  the  victorious  party  put  also  some  ragged  flags  in 
churches).  And  then  the  capitalists  tax  both,  annually,  ever 
afterwards,  to  pay  interest  on  the  loan  of  the  guns  and  gun- 
powder. And  that  is  wThat  capitalists  call  "  knowing  what  to 
do  with  their  money  ; "  and  what  commercial  men  in  general 
call  "  practical "  as  opposed  to  "  sentimental  "  Political  Econ- 
omy. 

Eleven  years  ago,  in  the  summer  of  1860,  perceiving  then 
fully,  (as  Carlyle  had  done  long  before),  what  distress  was 
about  to  come  on  the  said  populace  of  Europe  through  these 
errors  of  their  teachers,  I  began  to  do  the  best  I  might,  to 
combat  them,  in  the  series  of  papers  for  the  Cornhill  Magazine, 
since  published  under  the  title  of  Unto  this  Last.  The  editor 
of  the  Magazine  was  my  friend,  and  ventured  the  insertion  of 
the  three  first  essays ;  but  the  outcry  against  them  became 
then  too  strong  for  any  editor  to  endure,  and  he  wrote  to  me, 
with  great  discomfort  to  himself,  and  man}'  apologies  to  me, 
that  the  Magazine  must  only  admit  one  Economical  Essay 
more. 


V RE  FACE. 


I  made,  with  his  permission,  the  last  one  longer  than  ths 
rest,  and  gave  it  blunt  conclusion  as  well  as  I  could — and  so 
the  book  now  stands ;  but,  as  I  had  taken  not  a  little  pain  a 
with  the  Essays,  and  knew  that  they  contained  better  work 
than  most  of  my  former  writings,  and  more  important  truths 
than  all  of  them  put  together,  this  violent  reprobation  of 
them  by  the  Cornhill  public  set  me  still  more  gravely  think- 
ing ;  and,  after  turning  the  matter  hither  and  thither  in  my 
mind  for  two  years  more,  I  resolved  to  make  it  the  central 
wrork  of  my  life  to  write  an  exhaustive  treatise  on  Political 
Economy.  It  would  not  have  been  begun,  at  that  time,  how- 
ever, had  not  the  editor  of  Frasei's  Magazine  written  to  me, 
saying  that  he  believed  there  was  something  in  my  theories, 
and  would  risk  the  admission  of  what  I  chose  to  write  on  this 
dangerous  subject  ;  whereupon,  cautiously,  and  at  intervals, 
during  the  winter  of  1862-63,  I  sent  him,  and  he  ventured  to 
print,  the  preface  of  the  intended  work,  divided  into  four 
chapters.  Then,  though  the  Editor  had  not  wholly  lost  cour- 
age, the  Publisher  indignantly  interfered  ;  and  the  readers  of 
Fraser,  as  those  of  the  Cornhill,  were  protected,  for  that  time, 
from  farther  disturbance  on  my  part.  Subsequently,  loss  of 
health,  family  distress,  and  various  untoward  chances,  pre- 
vented my  proceeding  with  the  body  of  the  book ; — seven 
years  have  passed  ineffectually  ;  and  I  am  now  fain  to  reprint 
the  Preface  by  itself,  under  the  title  which  I  intended  for  the 
whole. 

Not  discontentedly  ;  being,  at  this  time  of  life,  resigned  to 
the  sense  of  failure  ;  and  also,  because  the  preface  is  com- 
plete in  itself  as  a  body  of  definitions,  which  I  now  require 
for  reference  in  the  course  of  my  Letters  to  Workmen  ;  by 
which  also,  in  time,  I  trust  less  formally  to  accomplish  the 
chief  purpose  of  Munera  Palveris,  practically  summed  in  the 
two  paragraphs  27  and  28  :  namely,  to  examine  the  moral 
results  and  possible  rectifications  of  the  laws  of  distribution 
of  wealth,  which  have  prevailed  hitherto  without  debate 
among  men.  Laws  which  ordinary  economists  assume  to  be 
inviolable,  and  which  ordinary  socialists  imagine  to  be  on  the 
eve  of  total  abrogation,    But  they  are  both  alike  deceived 


PREFACE. 


109 


The  laws  which  at  present  regulate  the  possession  of  wealth 
are  unjust,  because  the  motives  which  provoke  to  its  attain- 
ment are  impure  ;  but  no  socialism  can  effect  their  abroga- 
tion, unless  it  can  abrogate  also  covetousness  and  pride,  which 
it  is  by  no  means  yet  in  the  way  of  doing.  Nor  can  the 
change  be,  in  any  case,  to  the  extent  that  has  been  imaginedc 
Extremes  of  luxury  may  be  forbidden,  and  agony  of  penury 
relieved  ;  but  nature  intends,  and  the  utmost  efforts  of  social- 
ism will  not  hinder  the  fulfilment  of  her  intention,  that  a 
provident  person  shall  always  be  richer  than  a  spendthrift ; 
and  an  ingenious  one  more  comfortable  than  a  fool.  But, 
indeed,  the  adjustment  of  the  possession  of  the  products  of 
industry  depends  more  on  their  nature  than  their  quantity, 
and  on  wise  determination  therefore  of  the  aims  of  industry. 
A  nation  which  desires  true  wealth,  desires  it  moderately, 
and  can  therefore  distribute  it  with  kindness,  and  possess  it 
with  pleasure  ;  but  one  which  desires  false  wealth,  desires  it 
immoderately,  and  can  neither  dispense  it  with  justice,  nor 
enjoy  it  in  peace. 

Therefore,  needing,  constantly  in  my  present  work,  to  refei 
to  the  definitions  of  true  and  false  wealth  given  in  the  fol- 
lowing Essays,  I  republish  them  with  careful  revisal.  They 
were  written  abroad  ;  partly  at  Milan,  partly  during  a  winter 
residence  on  the  south-eastern  slope  of  the  Mont  Saleve,  near 
Geneva  ;  and  sent  to  London  in  as  legible  MS.  as  I  could 
write  ;  but  I  never  revised  the  press  sheets,  and  have  been 
obliged,  accordingly,  now  to  amend  the  text  here  and  there, 
or  correct  it  in  unimportant  particulars.  Wherever  any 
modification  has  involved  change  in  the  sense,  it  is  enclosed 
in  square  brackets  ;  and  what  few  explanatory  comments  1 
have  felt  it  necessary  to  add,  have  been  indicated  in  the  same 
manner.  No  explanatory  comments,  I  regret  to  perceive,  will 
suffice  to  remedy  the  mischief  of  my  affected  concentration  of 
language,  into  the  habit  of  which  I  fell  by  thinking  too  long- 
over  particular  passages,  in  many  and  many  a  solitary  walk 
towards  the  mountains  of  Bonneville  or  Annecy.  But  I  never 
intended  the  book  for  anything  else  than  a  dictionary  of 
reference,  and  that  for  earnest  readers  ;  who  will,  I  have  good 


110 


PREFACE. 


hope,  if  they  find  what  they  want  in  it,  forgive  the  affectedlj 

curt  expressions. 

The  Essays,  as  originally  published,  were,  as  I  have  just 
stated,  four  in  number.  I  have  now,  more  conveniently, 
divided  the  whole  into  six  chapters  ;  and  (as  I  purpose 
throughout  this  edition  of  my  works)  numbered  the  para- 
graphs. 

I  inscribed  the  first  volume  of  this  series  to  the  friend  who 
aided  me  in  chief  sorrow.  Let  me  inscribe  the  second  to 
the  friend  and  guide  who  has  urged  me  to  all  chief  labour, 
Thomas  Carlyle. 

I  would  that  some  better  means  were  in  my  power  of 
showing  reverence  to  the  man  who  alone,  of  all  our  masters 
of  literature,  has  written,  without  thought  of  himself,  what 
he  knew  it  to  be  needful  for  the  people  of  his  time  to  hear,  if 
the  wTill  to  hear  were  in  them  :  whom,  therefore,  as  the  time 
draws  near  when  his  task  must  be  ended,  Republican  and 
Free-thoughted  England  assaults  with  impatient  reproach ; 
and  out  of  the  abyss  of  her  cowardice  in  policy  and  dis- 
honour in  trade,  sets  the  hacks  of  her  literature  to  speak  evil, 
grateful  to  her  ears,  of  the  Solitary  Teacher  who  has  asked 
her  to  be  brave  for  the  help  of  Man,  and  just,  for  the  love 
of  God. 

Denmark  Hill, 


MIINERA  PULYERIS. 


Te  maris  et  terrae  numeroqute  carentis  arenas 

Mensorem  cohibent,  Areliyta, 
Pulveris  exigui  prope  litus  parva  Matinum 

Munera." 


CHAPTER  I. 

DEFINITIONS. 

L  As  domestic  economy  regulates  the  acts  and  habits  of  a 
household,  Political  economy  regulates  those  of  a  society  or 
State,  with  reference  to  the  means  of  its  maintenance. 

Political  economy  is  neither  an  art  nor  a  science ;  but  a 
system  of  conduct  and  legislature,  founded  on  the  sciences, 
directing  the  arts,  and  impossible,  except  under  certain  con- 
ditions of  moral  culture. 

2.  The  study  which  lately  in  England  has  been  called  Po- 
litical Economy  is  in  reality  nothing  more  than  the  investiga- 
tion of  some  accidental  phenomena  of  modern  commercial 
operations,  nor  has  it  been  true  in  its  investigation  even  of 
these.  It  has  no  connection  whatever  with  political  economy, 
as  understood  and  treated  of  by  the  great  thinkers  of  past 
ages  ;  and  as  long  as  its  unscholarly  and  undefined  statements 
are  allowed  to  pass  under  the  same  name,  every  word  written 
on  the  subject  by  those  thinkers — and  chiefly  the  v/ords  of 
Plato,  Xenophon,  Cicero  and  Bacon — must  be  nearly  useless 
to  mankind.  The  reader  must  not,  therefore,  be  surprised  at 
the  care  and  insistance  with  wrhich  I  have  retained  the  literal 
and  earliest  sense  of  all  important  terms  used  in  these  papers  i 


112 


M'JNEUA  PUL  VERTS. 


for  a  word  is  usually  well  made  at  the  time  it  is  first  wanted  » 
its  youngest  meaning  has  in  it  the  full  strength  of  its  youth  ; 
subsequent  senses  are  commonly  warped  or  weakened  ;  ancl 
as  all  careful  thinkers  are  sure  to  have  used  their  words  ao« 
curately,  the  first  condition,  in  order  to  be  able  to  avail  our- 
selves of  their  sayings  at  all,  is  firm  definition  of  terms. 

3.  By  the  "  maintenance  "  of  a  State  is  to  be  understood 
the  support  of  its  population  in  healthy  and  happy  life  ;  and 
the  increase  of  their  numbers,  so  far  as  that  increase  is  con- 
sistent with  their  happiness.  It  is  not  the  object  of  political 
economy  to  increase  the  numbers  of  a  nation  at  the  cost  of 
common  health  or  comfort ;  nor  to  increase  indefinitely  the 
comfort  of  individuals,  by  sacrifice  of  surrounding  lives,  or 
possibilities  of  life. 

4.  The  assumption  which  lies  at  the  root  of  nearly  all  er- 
roneous reasoning  on  political  economy, — namely,  that  its 
object  is  to  accumulate  money  or  exchangeable  property, — 
may  be  shown  in  a  fewwrords  to  be  without  foundation.  For 
no  economist  would  admit  national  economy  to  be  legitimate 
which  proposed  to  itself  only  the  building  of  a  pyramid  of 
gold.  He  would  declare  the  gold  to  be  wasted,  were  it  to  re- 
main in  the  monumental  form,  and  would  say  it  ought  to  be 
employed.  But  to  what  end  ?  Either  it  must  be  used  only  to 
gain  more  gold,  and  build  a  larger  pyramid,  or  for  some  pur- 
pose other  than  the  gaining  of  gold.  And  this  other  purpose, 
however  at  first  apprehended,  will  be  found  to  resolve  itself 
finally  into  the  service  of  man  ; — that  is  to  say,  the  extension, 
defence,  or  comfort  of  his  life.  The  golden  pyramid  may  per- 
haps be  providently  built,  perhaps  improvidently  ;  but  the 
wisdom  or  folly  of  the  accumulation  can  only  be  determined 
by  our  having  first  clearly  stated  the  aim  of  all  economy, 
namely,  the  extension  of  life. 

If  the  accumulation  df  money,  or  of  exchangeable  property, 
were  a  certain  means  of  extending  existence,  it  would  be  use- 
less, in  discussing  economical  questions,  to  fix  our  attention 
upon  the  more  distent  object — life — instead  of  the  immediate 
one — money.  But  it  is  not  so.  Money  may  sometimes  be 
accumulated  at  the  cost  of  life,  or  by  limitations  of  it ;  that  ia 


MUNERA  PULVERI8. 


113 


to  say,  either  by  hastening  the  deaths  of  men,  or  preventing 
their  births.  It  is  therefore  necessary  to  keep  clearly  in  view 
the  ultimate  object  of  economy ;  and  to  determine  the  expe- 
diency of  minor  operations  with  reference  to  that  ulterior  end» 

5.  It  has  been  just  stated  that  the  object  of  political  economy 
is  the  continuance  not  only  of  life,  but  of  healthy  and  happy 
life.  But  all  true  happiness  is  both  a  consequence  and  cause 
of  life  :  it  is  a  sign  of  its  vigor,  and  source  of  its  continuance. 
All  true  suffering  is  in  like  manner  a  consequence  and  cause 
of  death.  I  shall  therefore,  in  future,  use  the  word  "  Life 99 
singly  :  but  let  it  be  understood  to  include  in  its  signification 
the  happiness  and  power  of  the  entire  human  nature,  body 
and  soul. 

6.  That  human  nature,  as  its  Creator  made  it,  and  main- 
tains it  wherever  His  laws  are  observed,  is  entirely  harmoni- 
ous. No  physical  error  can  be  more  profound,  no  moral  error 
more  dangerous,  than  that  involved  in  the  monkish  doctrine 
of  the  opposition  of  body  to  soul.  No  soul  can  be  perfect 
in  an  imperfect  body  :  no  body  perfect  without  perfect  soul. 
Every  right  action  and  true  thought  sets  the  seal  of  its  beauty 
on  person  and  face  ;  every  wrong  action  and  foul  thought  its 
seal  of  distortion  ;  and  the  various  aspects  of  humanity  might 
be  read  as  plainly  as  a  printed  history,  were  it  not  that  the 
impressions  are  so  complex  that  it  must  always  in  some  cases 
(and,  in  the  present  state  of  our  knowledge,  in  all  cases)  be 
impossible  to  decipher  them  completely.  Nevertheless,  the 
face  of  a  consistently  just,  and  of  a  consistently  unjust  person, 
may  always  be  rightly  distinguished  at  a  glance  ;  and  if  the 
qualities  are  continued  by  descent  through  a  generation  or 
two,  there  arises  a  complete  distinction  of  race.  Both  moral 
and  physical  qualities  are  communicated  by  descent,  far  more 
than  they  can  be  developed  by  education  ;  (though  both  may 
be  destroyed  by  want  of  education),  and  there  is  as  yet  no  as- 
certained limit  to  the  nobleness  of  person  and  mind  which  the 
human  creature  may  attain,  by  persevering  observance  of  the 
laws  of  God  respecting  its  birth  and  training. 

7.  We  must  therefore  yet  farther  define  the  aim  of  political 
economy  to  be  "  The  multiplication  of  human  life  at  the  high* 


114 


MUNERA  PULVERIS. 


est  standard."  It  might  at  first  seem  questionable  whethei 
we  should  endeavour  to  maintain  a  small  number  of  persona 
of  the  highest  type  of  beauty  and  intelligence,  or  a  larger 
number  of  an  inferior  class.  But  I  shall  be  able  to  show  in 
the  sequel,  that  the  way  to  maintain  the  largest  number  is 
first  to  aim  at  the  highest  standard.  Determine  the  noblest 
type  of  man,  and  aim  simply  at  maintaining  the  largest  possi- 
ble number  of  persons  of  that  class,  and  it  will  be  found  that 
the  largest  possible  number  of  every  healthy  subordinate  class 
must  necessarily  be  produced  also. 

8.  The  perfect  type  of  manhood,  as  just  stated,  involves 
the  perfections  (whatever  we  may  hereafter  determine  these 
to  be)  of  his  body,  affections,  and  intelligence.  The  material 
things,  therefore,  which  it  is  the  object  of  political  economy 
to  produce  and  use,  (or  accumulate  for  use,)  are  things  which 
serve  either  to  sustain  and  comfort  the  body,  or  exercise 
rightly  the  affections  and  form  the  intelligence.*  Whatever 
truly  serves  either  of  these  purposes  is  "  useful "  to  man, 
wholesome,  healthful,  helpful,  or  holy.  By  seeking  such 
things,  man  prolongs  and  increases  his  life  upon  the  earth. 

On  the  other  hand,  whatever  does  not  serve  either  of  these 
purposes, — much  more  whatever  counteracts  them, — is  in  like 
manner  useless  to  man,  unwholesome,  unhelpful,  or  unholy  ; 
and  by  seeking  such  things  man  shortens  and  diminishes  his 
life  upon  the  earth. 

9.  And  neither  with  respect  to  things  useful  or  useless  can 
man's  estimate  of  them  alter  their  nature.  Certain  sub- 
stances being  good  for  his  food,  and  others  noxious  to  him, 
what  he  thinks  or  wishes  respecting  them  can  neither  change, 
nor  prevent,  their  power.  If  he  eats  corn,  he  will  live  ;  if 
nightshade,  he  will  die.  If  he  produce  or  make  good  and 
beautiful  things,  they  will  Re-Create  him  ;  (note  the  solemnity 
and  weight  of  the  word)  ;  if  bad  and  ugly  things,  they  will 
"corrupt"  or  "break  in  pieces" — that  is,  in  the  exact  degree 
of  their  power,  Kill  him.  For  every  hour  of  labour,  however 
enthusiastic  or  well  intended,  which  he  spends  for  that  which 
is  not  bread,  so  much  possibility  of  life  is  lost  to  him.  His 

*  See  Appendix  I. 


MUNERA  PULVERI8. 


115 


fancies,  likings,  beliefs,  however  brilliant,  eager,  or  obstinate, 
are  of  no  avail  if  they  are  set  on  a  false  object.  Of  all  that 
he  has  laboured  for,  the  eternal  law  of  heaven  and  earth  meas- 
ures out  to  him  for  reward,  to  the  utmost  atom,  that  part 
which  he  ought  to  have  laboured  for,  and  withdraws  from 
him  (or  enforces  on  him,  it  may  be)  inexorably,  that  part 
which  he  ought  not  to  have  laboured  for  until,  on  his  summer 
threshing-floor,  stands  his  heap  of  corn  ;  little  or  much,  not 
according  to  his  labour,  but  to  his  discretion.  No  "  com- 
mercial arrangements, "  no  painting  of  surfaces,  nor  alloying 
of  substances,  will  avail  him  a  pennyweight.  Nature  asks  of 
him  calmly  and  inevitably,  What  have  you  found,  or  formed— 
the  right  thing  or  the  wrong  ?  By  the  right  thing  you  shall 
live  ;  by  the  wrong  you  shall  die. 

10.  To  thoughtless  persons  it  seems  otherwise.  The  world 
looks  to  them  as  if  they  could  cozen  it  out  of  some  ways  and 
means  of  life.  But  they  cannot  cozen  it  :  they  can  only  cozen 
their  neighbours.  The  world  is  not  to  be  cheated  of  a  grain  ; 
not  so  much  as  a  breath  of  its  air  can  be  drawn  surreptitiously. 
For  every  piece  of  wise  work  done,  so  much  life  is  granted  ; 
for  every  piece  of  foolish  work,  nothing ;  for  every  piece  of 
wicked  work,  so  much  death  is  allotted.  This  is  as  sure  as 
the  courses  of  day  and  night.  But  when  the  means  of  life 
are  once  produced,  men,  by  their  various  struggles  and  in- 
dustries of  accumulation  or  exchange,  may  variously  gather, 
waste,  restrain,  or  distribute  them  ;  necessitating,  in  propor- 
tion to  the  waste  or  restraint,  accurately,  so  much  more  death. 
The  rate  and  range  of  additional  death  are  measured  by  the 
rate  and  range  of  waste  ;  and  are  inevitable  ; — the  only  ques- 
tion (determined  mostly  by  fraud  in  peace,  and  force  in  war) 
is,  Who  is  to  die,  and  how  ? 

11.  Such  being  the  everlasting  law  of  human  existence,  the 
essential  work  of  the  political  economist  is  to  determine  what 
are  in  reality  useful  or  life-giving  things,  and  by  what  degrees 
and  kinds  of  labour  they  are  attainable  and  distributable.  • 
This  investigation  divides  itself  under  three  great  heads  ; — 
the  studies,  namely,  of  the  phenomena,  first,  of  Wealth  ;  sec- 
ondly, of  Money  ;  and  thirdly,  of  Kiohe& 


116 


JM  UN  ERA  PULVERIS. 


These  terms  are  often  used  as  synonymous,  but  they  sig* 
nify  entirely  different  things.  " Wealth"  consists  of  things 
in  themselves  valuable  ;  "  Money/'  of  documentary  claims  to 
the  possession  of  such  things ;  and  "  Riches  "  is  a  relative 
term,  expressing  the  magnitude  of  the  possessions  of  one 
person  or  society  as  compared  with  those  of  other  persons  or 
societies. 

The  study  of  Wealth  is  a  province  of  natural  science :— it 
deals  with  the  essential  properties  of  things. 

The  study  or  Money  is  a  province  of  commercial  science  : — 
it  deals  with  conditions  of  engagement  and  exchange. 

The  study  of  Eiches  is  a  province  of  moral  science  :  —it 
deals  with  the  due  relations  of  men  to  each  other  in  regard  of 
material  possessions  ;  and  with  the  just  laws  of  their  associa- 
tion for  purposes  of  labour. 

I  shall  in  this  first  chapter  shortly  sketch  out  the  range  of 
subjects  which  will  come  before  us  as  we  follow  th*se  three 
branches  of  inquiry. 

12.  And  first  of  Wealth,  which,  it  has  been  said,  consists 
of  things  essentially  valuable.  We  now,  therefore,  need  a 
definition  of  "  value." 

"  Value"  signifies  the  strength,  or  "availing"  of  anything 
towards  the  sustaining  of  life,  and  is  always  two-fold  ;  that  is 
to  say,  primarily,  intrinsic,  and  secondarily,  effectual. 

The  reader  must,  by  anticipation,  be  warned  against  confus- 
ing value  with  cost,  or  with  price.  Value  is  the  life-giving 
power  of anything  ;  cost,  the  quantity  of  labour  required  to  pro- 
duce  it  ;  price,  the  quantity  of  labour  which  its  possessor  will 
take  in  exchange  for  it*  Cost  and  price  are  commercial  condi- 
tions, to  be  studied  under  the  head  of  money. 

13.  Intrinsic  value  is  the  absolute  power  of  anything  to 
support  life.  A  sheaf  of  wheat  of  given  quality  and  weight 
has  in  it  a  measurable  power  of  sustaining  the  substance  of 
the  body  ;  a  cubic  foot  of  pure  air,  a  fixed  power  of  sustain- 

•    ing  its  warmth  ;  and  a  cluster  of  flowers  of  given  beauty  a  fixed 
power  of  enlivening  or  animating  the  senses  and  heart. 

[*  Observe  these  definitions,— they  are  of  much  importance,— and  coa 
nect  with  them  the  sentences  in  italics  on  this  and  the  next  page.] 


MUNERA  PULVER1S. 


117 


It  does  not  in  the  least  affect  the  intrinsic  value  of  the 
Wheat,  the  air,  or  the  flowers,  that  men  refuse  or  despise  them. 
Used  or  not,  their  own  power  is  in  them,  and  that  particular 
power  is  in  nothing  else. 

14.  But  in  order  that  this  value  of  theirs  may  become  ef- 
fectual, a  certain  state  is  necessary  in  the  recipient  of  it.  The 
digesting,  breathing,  and  perceiving  functions  must  be  perfect 
in  the  human  creature  before  the  food,  air,  or  flowers  can  be- 
come of  their  full  value  to  it.  The  production  of  effectual  val- 
ue, therefore,  always  involves  two  needs :  first,  the  production  of 
a  thing  essentially  useful ;  then  the  production  of  the  capacity 
to  use  it.  Where  the  intrinsic  value  and  acceptant  capacity 
come  together  there  is  Effectual  value,  or  wealth  ;  where 
there  is  either  no  intrinsic  value,  or  no  acceptant  capacity, 
there  is  no  effectual  value  ;  that  is  to  say,  no  wealth.  A  horse 
is  no  wealth  to  us  if  we  cannot  ride,  nor  a  picture  if  we  can- 
not see,  nor  can  any  noble  thing  be  wealth,  except  to  a  noble  per- 
son. As  the  aptness  of  the  user  increases,  the  effectual  value 
of  the  thing  used  increases  ;  and  in  its  entirety  can  co-exist 
only  with  perfect  skill  of  use,  and  fitness  of  nature. 

15.  Valuable  material  things  may  be  conveniently  referred 
to  five  heads  : 

(i.)  Land,  with  its  associated  air,  water,  and  organisms, 
(ii.)  Houses,  furniture,  and  instruments, 
(iii.)  Stored  or  prepared  food,  medicine,  and  articles  of  bod- 
ily luxury,  including  clothing, 
(iv.)  Books, 
(v.)  Works  of  art. 

The  conditions  of  value  in  these  things  are  briefly  as  fol- 
lows : — 

16.  (i.)  Land.  Its  value  is  twofold  ;  first,  as  producing 
food  and  mechanical  power  ;  secondly,  as  an  object  of  sight 
and  thought,  producing  intellectual  power. 

Its  value,  as  a  means  of  producing  food  and  mechanical 
power,  varies  with  its  form  (as  mountain  or  plain),  with  its 
substance  (in  soil  or  mineral  contents),  and  with  its  climate. 
All  these  conditions  of  intrinsic  value  must  be  known  and  com* 
$lied  with  by  the  men  who  have  to  deal  with  it,  in  order  to 


US 


ML  N ERA  pul  verts. 


give  effectual  value  ;  but  at  any  given  time  and  place,  the  in* 
trinsic  value  is  fixed  :  such  and  such  a  piece  of  land,  with  its 
'issociated  lakes  and  seas,  rightly  treated  in  surface  and  sub* 
fetance,  can  produce  precisely  so  much  food  and  power,  and 
no  more. 

The  second  element  of  value  in  land  being  its  beauty, 
united  with  such  conditions  of  space  and  form  as  are  neces- 
sary for  exercise,  and  for  fullness  of  animal  life,  land  of  the 
highest  value  in  these  respects  will  be  that  lying  in  temperate 
climates,  and  boldly  varied  in  form  ;  removed  from  unhealthy 
or  dangerous  influences  (as  of  miasm  or  volcano)  ;  and  capa- 
ble of  sustaining  a  rich  fauna  and  flora.  Such  land,  care- 
fully tended  by  the  hand  of  man,  so  far  as  to  remove  from 
it  unsightlinesses  and  evidences  of  decay,  guarded  from  via* 
lence,  and  inhabited,  under  man's  affectionate  protection, 
by  every  kind  of  living  creature  that  can  occupy  it  in  peace, 
is  the  most  precious  "  property  "  that  human  beings  can  pos- 
sess. 

17.  (ii.)  Buildings,  furniture,  and  instruments. 

The  value  of  buildings  consists,  first,  in  permanent  strength, 
with  convenience  of  form,  of  size,  and  of  position  ;  so  as  to 
render  employment  peaceful,  social  intercourse  easy,  tempera- 
ture and  air  healthy.  The  advisable  or  possible  magnitude  of 
cities  and  mode  of  their  distribution  in  squares,  streets, 
courts,  &c. ;  the  relative  value  of  sites  of  land,  and  the  modes 
of  structure  which  are  healthiest  and  most  permanent,  have  to 
be  studied  under  this  head. 

The  value  of  buildings  consists  secondly  in  historical  asso- 
ciation, and  architectural  beauty,  of  which  we  have  to  examine 
the  influence  on  manners  and  life. 

The  value  of  instruments  consists,  first,  in  their  power  of 
shortening  labour,  or  otherwise  accomplishing  what  human 
strength  unaided  could  not.  The  kinds  of  work  which  are 
severally  best  accomplished  by  hand  or  by  machine ; — the  ef- 
fect of  machinery  in  gathering  and  multiplying  population, 
and  its  influence  on  the  minds  and  bodies  of  such  population ; 
together  with  the  conceivable  uses  of  machinery  on  a  colossal 
Bcale  in  accomplishing  mighty  and  useful  works,  hitherto  un* 


MUNERA  PUL  VERIS. 


119 


thought  of,  such  as  the  deepening  of  large  river  channels  ;— « 
changing  the  surface  of  mountainous  districts  ; — irrigating 
tracts  of  desert  in  the  torrid  zone  ; — breaking  up,  and  thus 
rendering  capable  of  quicker  fusion,  edges  of  ice  in  the  north- 
ern and  southern  Arctic  seas,  &c,  so  rendering  parts  of  the 
earth  habitable  which  hitherto  have  been  lifeless,  are  to  be 
studied  under  this  head. 

The  value  of  instruments  is,  secondarily,  in  their  aid  to  ab- 
stract sciences.  The  degree  in  which  the  multiplication  of 
such  instruments  should  be  encouraged,  so  as  to  make  them, 
if  large,  easy  of  access  to  numbers  (as  costly  telescopes),  or  so 
cheap  as  that  they  might,  in  a  serviceable  form,  become  a 
common  part  of  the  furniture  of  households,  is  to  be  consid- 
ered under  this  head.* 

18.  (iii.)  Food,  medicine,  and  articles  of  luxury.  Under 
this  head  we  shall  have  to  examine  the  possible  methods  of 
obtaining  pure  food  in  such  security  and  equality  of  supply 
as  to  avoid  both  waste  and  famine  :  then  the  economy  of 
medicine  and  just  range  of  sanitary  law  :  finally  the  economy 
of  luxury,  partly  an  aesthetic  and  partly  an  ethical  question. 

19.  (iv.)  Books.    The  value  of  these  consists, 

First,  in  their  power  of  preserving  and  communicating  the 
knowledge  of  facts. 

Secondly,  in  their  power  of  exciting  vital  or  noble  emotion 
and  intellectual  action.  They  have  also  their  corresponding 
negative  powers  of  disguising  and  effacing  the  memory  of 
facts,  and  killing  the  noble  emotions,  or  exciting  base  ones. 
Under  these  two  heads  we  have  to  consider  the  economical 
and  educational  value,  positive  and  negative,  of  literature  ; — 
the  means  of  producing  and  educating  good  authors,  and  the 
means  and  advisability  of  rendering  good  books  generally  ac- 
cessible, and  directing  the  reader's  choice  to  them. 

[*  I  cannot  now  recast  these  sentences,  pedantic  in  their  generaliza- 
tion, and  intended  more  for  index  than  statement,  but  I  must  guard 
the  reader  from  thinking  that  I  ever  wish  for  cheapness  by  bad  quality. 
A  poor  boy  need  not  always  learn  mathematics  ;  but,  if  you  set  him  ta 
do  so,  have  the  farther  kindness  to  give  him  good  compasses,  not  cheaj 
»nes,  whose  points  bend  like  lead.  ] 


120 


M  UN  ERA  PULVEUIS. 


20.  (v. )  Works  of  art.  The  value  of  these  is  of  the  sarna 
nature  as  that  of  books  ;  but  the  laws  of  their  production  and 
possible  modes  of  distribution  are  very  different,  and  require 
separate  examination. 

21.  II. — Money.  Under  this  head,  we  shall  have  to  ex- 
amine  the  laws  of  currency  and  exchange  ;  of  which  I  will 
note  here  the  first  principles. 

Money  has  been  inaccurately  spoken  of  as  merely  a  means 
of  exchange.  But  it  is  far  more  than  this.  It  is  a  document- 
ary expression  of  legal  claim.  It  is  not  wealth,  but  a  docu- 
mentary claim  to  wealth,  being  the  sign  of  the  relative  quan- 
tities of  it,  or  of  the  labour  producing  it,  to  which,  at  a  given 
time,  persons,  or  societies,  are  entitled. 

If  all  the  money  in  the  world,  notes  and  gold,  were  de- 
stroyed in  an  instant,  it  would  leave  the  world  neither  richer 
nor  poorer  than  it  was.  But  it  would  leave  the  individual 
inhabitants  of  it  in  different  relations. 

Money  is,  therefore,  correspondent  in  its  nature  to  the 
title-deed  of  an  estate.  Though  the  deed  be  burned,  the 
estate  still  exists,  but  the  right  to  it  has  become  dispu- 
table. 

22.  The  real  worth  of  money  remains  unchanged,  as  long 
as  the  proportion  of  the  quantity  of  existing  money  to  the 
quantity  of  existing  wealth  or  available  labour  remains  un- 
changed. 

If  the  wealth  increases,  but  not  the  money,  the  worth  of 
the  money  increases  ;  if  the  money  increases,  but  not  the 
wealth,  the  worth  of  the  money  diminishes. 

23.  Money,  therefore,  cannot  be  arbitrarily  multiplied,  any 
more  than  title-deeds  can.  So  long  as  the  existing  wealth  or 
available  labour  is  not  fully  represented  by  the  currency,  the 
currency  may  be  increased  without  diminution  of  the  assigned 
worth  of  its  pieces.  But  when  the  existing  wealth,  or  avail- 
able labour  is  once  fully  represented,  every  piece  of  money 
thrown  into  circulation  diminishes  the  worth  of  every  other 
existing  piece,  in  the  proportion  it  bears  to  the  number  of 
them,  provided  the  new  piece  be  received  with  equal  credit ; 


MUNERA  rULVERIS. 


121 


if  not,  the  depreciation  of  worth  takes  place,  according  to  the 
degree  of  its  credit. 

24.  When,  however,  new  money,  composed  of  some  sub- 
stance of  supposed  intrinsic  value  (as  of  gold),  is  brought  into 
the  market,  or  when  new  notes  are  issued  which  are  sup- 
posed to  be  deserving  of  credit,  the  desire  to  obtain  the  money 
will,  under  certain  circumstances,  stimulate  industry :  an  ad- 
ditional quantity  of  wealth  is  immediately  produced,  and  if 
this  be  in  proportion  to  the  new  claims  advanced,  the  value 
of  the  existing  currency  is  undepreciated.  If  the  stimulus 
given  be  so  great  as  to  produce  more  goods  than  are  pro- 
portioned to  the  additional  coinage,  the  worth  of  the  exist- 
ing currency  will  be  raised. 

Arbitrary  control  and  issues  of  currency  affect  the  produc- 
tion of  wealth,  by  acting  on  the  hopes  and  fears  of  men,  and 
are,  under  certain  circumstances,  wise.  But  the  issue  of  ad- 
ditional currency  to  meet  the  exigencies  of  immediate  ex- 
pense, is  merely  one  of  the  disguised  forms  of  borrowing  or 
taxing.  It  is,  however,  in  the  present  low  state  of  economical 
knowledge,  often  possible  for  governments  to  venture  on  an 
issue  of  currency,  when  they  could  not  venture  on  an  addi- 
tional loan  or  tax,  because  the  real  operation  of  such  issue  is 
not  understood  by  the  people,  and  the  pressure  of  it  is  irreg- 
ularly distributed,  and  with  an  unperceived  gradation. 

25.  The  use  of  substances  of  intrinsic  value  as  the  materials 
of  a  currency,  is  a  barbarism  ; — a  remnant  of  the  conditions  of 
barter,  which  alone  render  commerce  possible  among  savage 
nations.  It  is,  however,  still  necessary,  partly  as  a  mechanical 
check  on  arbitrary  issues ;  partly  as  a  means  of  exchanges 
with  foreign  nations.  In  proportion  to  the  extension  of  civi- 
lization, and  increase  of  trustworthiness  in  Governments,  it  will 
cease.  So  long  as  it  exists,  the  phenomena  of  the  cost  and 
price  of  the  articles  used  for  currency  are  mingled  with  those 
proper  to  currency  itself,  in  an  almost  inextricable  manner  : 
and  the  market  worth  of  bullion  is  affected  by  multitudinous 
accidental  circumstances,  which  have  been  traced,  with  more 
or  less  success,  by  writers  on  commercial  operations  :  but 
with  these  variations  the  true  political  economist  has  no  more 


122 


MUNERA  PULVER1S. 


to  do  than  an  engineer,  fortifying  k  harbour  of  refuge  against 
Atlantic  tide,  has  to  concern  himself  with  the  cries  or  quarrels 
of  children  who  dig  pools  with  their  fingers  for  its  streams 
among  the  sand. 

26.  III. — Eiches.  According  to  the  various  industry,  ca- 
pacity, good  fortune,  and  desires  of  men,  they  obtain  greater 
or  smaller  share  of,  and  claim  upon,  the  wealth  of  the  world. 

The  inequalities  between  these  shares,  always  in  some  de- 
gree just  and  necessary,  may  be  either  restrained  by  law  or 
circumstance  within  certain  limits  ;  or  may  increase  indefi- 
nitely. 

"Where  no  moral  or  legal  restraint  is  put  upon  the  exercise 
of  the  will  and  intellect  of  the  stronger,  shrewder,  or  more 
covetous  men,  these  differences  become  ultimately  enormous. 
But  as  soon  as  they  become  so  distinct  in  their  extremes  as 
that,  on  one  side,  there  shall  be  manifest  redundance  of  pos- 
session, and  on  the  other  manifest  pressure  of  need, — the 
terms  "  riches  "  and  "  poverty  "  are  used  to  express  the  op- 
posite states;  being  contrary  only  as  the  terms  "warmth" 
and  "  cold  "  are  contraries,  of  which  neither  implies  an  actual 
degree,  but  only  a  relation  to  other  degrees,  of  temperature. 

27.  Eespecting  riches,  the  economist  has  to  inquire,  first, 
into  the  advisable  modes  of  their  collection ;  secondly,  into 
the  advisable  modes  of  their  administration. 

Eespecting  the  collection  of  national  riches,  he  has  to  in- 
quire, first,  whether  he  is  justified  in  calling  the  nation  rich,  if 
the  quantity  of  wealth  it  possesses  relatively  to  the  wealth  of 
other  nations,  be  large  ;  irrespectively  of  the  manner  of  its 
distribution.  Or  does  the  mode  of  distribution  in  any  wise 
affect  the  nature  of  the  riches  ?  Thus,  if  the  king  alone  be 
rich — suppose  Croesus  or  Mausolus — are  the  Lydians  or 
Carians  therefore  a  rich  nation?  Or  if  a  few  slave-masters 
are  rich,  and  the  nation  is  otherwise  composed  of  slaves,  is  it 
to  be  called  a  rich  nation  ?  For  if  not,  and  the  ideas  of  a  cer- 
tain mode  of  distribution  or  operation  in  the  riches,  and  of  a 
certain  degree  of  freedom  in  the  people,  enter  into  our  idea  of 
riches  as  attributed  to  a  people,  we  shall  have  to  define  the 
degree  of  fluency,  or  circulative  character  which  is  essential  tc 


MUNERA  rULVERIS, 


123 


the  nature  of  common  wealth  ;  and  the  degree  of  indepen* 
dence  of  action  required  in  its  possessors.  Questions  which 
look  as  if  they  would  take  time  in  answering.* 

28.  And  farther.  Since  the  inequality,  which  is  the  condi* 
tion  of  riches,  may  be  established  in  two  opposite  modes — - 
namely,  by  increase  of  possession  on  the  one  side,  and  by  de- 
crease of  it  on  the  other — we  have  to  inquire,  with  respect  to 
any  given  state  of  riches,  precisely  in  what  manner  the  cor- 
relative poverty  was  produced  :  that  is  to  say,  whether  by 
being  surpassed  only,  or  being  depressed  also  ;  and  if  by  be- 
ing depressed,  what  are  the  advantages,  or  the  contrary,  con- 
ceivable in  the  depression.  For  instance,  it  being  one  of  the 
commonest  advantages  of  being  rich  to  entertain  a  number  of 
servants,  we  have  to  inquire,  on  the  one  side,  what  economical 
process  produced  the  riches  of  the  master  ;  and  on  the  other, 
what  economical  process  produced  the  poverty  of  the  persons 
who  serve  him  ;  and  what  advantages  each,  on  his  own  side, 
derives  from  the  result. 

29.  These  being  the  main  questions  touching  the  collection 
of  riches,  the  next,  or  last,  part  of  the  inquiry  is  into  their 
administration. 

Their  possession  involves  three  great  economical  powers 
which  require  separate  examination  :  namely,  the  powers  of 
selection,  direction,  and  provision. 

The  power  of  Selection  relates  to  things  of  which  the  sup- 
ply is  limited  (as  the  supply  of  best  things  is  always).  "When 
it  becomes  matter  of  question  to  whom  such  things  are  to  be- 
long, the  richest  person  has  necessarily  the  first  choice,  unless 
some  arbitrary  mode  of  distribution  be  otherwise  determined 
upon.  The  business  of  the  economist  is  to  show  how  this 
choice  may  be  a  wise  one. 

The  power  of  Direction  arises  out  of  the  necessary  relation 
of  rich  men  to  poor,  which  ultimately,  in  one  way  or  another, 

[*  I  regret  the  ironical  manner  in  which  this  passage,  one  of  great  im- 
portance in  the  matter  of  it,  was  written.  The  gist  of  it  is,  that  the  first 
of  all  inquiries  respecting  the  wealth  of  any  nation  is  not,  how  much  it 
lias ;  but  whether  it  is  in  a  form  that  can  be  used,  and  in  the  possession 
of  persons  who  can  use  it.  ] 


124 


M  UN  ERA  PULVERIS. 


involves  the  direction  of,  or  authority  over,  the  labour  ©f  the 
poor  ;  and  this  nearly  as  much  over  their  mental  as  their 
bodily  labour.  The  business  of  the  economist  is  to  show  how 
this  direction  may  be  a  Just  one. 

The  power  of  Provision  is  dependent  upon  the  redundance 
of  wealth,  which  may  of  course  by  active  persons  be  made 
available  in  preparation  for  future  work  or  future  profit ;  in 
which  function  riches  have  generally  received  the  name  of 
capital  ;  that  is  to  say,  of  head-,  or  source-material.  The 
business  of  the  economist  is  to  show  how  this  provision  may 
be  a  Distant  one. 

30.  The  examination  of  these  three  functions  of  riches  will 
embrace  every  final  problem  of  political  economy ; — and, 
above,  or  before  all,  this  curious  and  vital  problem, — whether, 
since  the  wholesome  action  of  riches  in  these  three  functions 
will  depend  (it  appears),  on  the  Wisdom,  Justice,  and  Far- 
sightedness of  the  holders  ;  and  it  is  by  no  means  to  be  as- 
sumed that  persons  primarily  rich,  must  therefore  be  just  and 
wise, — it  may  not  be  ultimately  possible  so,  or  somewhat  so,  to 
arrange  matters,  as  that  persons  primarily  just  and  wise,  should 
therefore  be  rich  ? 

Such  being  the  general  plan  of  the  inquiry  before  us,  I 
shall  not  limit  myself  to  any  consecutive  following  of  it,  having 
hardly  any  good  hope  of  being  able  to  complete  so  laborious 
a  work  as  it  must  prove  to  me  ;  but  from  time  to  time,  as  I 
have  leisure,  shall  endeavour  to  carry  forward  this  part  or  that, 
as  may  be  immediately  possible  ;  indicating  always  with  ac- 
curacy the  place  which  the  particular  essay  will  or  should  take 
in  the  completed  system. 


CHAPTEE  It 


STORE-KEEPING. 

81.  The  first  chapter  having  consisted  of  little  more  than  def- 
inition of  terms,  I  purpose,  in  this,  to  expand  and  illustrate 
the  given  definitions. 

The  view  which  has  here  been  taken  of  the  nature  of  wealth, 
namely,  that  it  consists  in  an  intrinsic  value  developed  by  a 
vital  power,  is  directly  opposed  to  two  nearly  universal  con- 
ceptions of  wealth.  In  the  assertion  that  value  is  primarily 
intrinsic,  it  opposes  the  idea  that  anything  which  is  an  object 
of  desire  to  numbers,  and  is  limited  in  quantity,  so  as  to  have 
rated  worth  in  exchange,  may  be  called,  or  virtually  become, 
wealth.  And  in  the  assertion  that  value  is,  secondarily,  de- 
pendent upon  power  in  the  possessor,  it  opposes  the  idea  that 
the  worth  of  things  depends  on  the  demand  for  them,  instead 
of  on  the  use  of  them.  Before  going  farther,  we  will  make 
these  two  positions  clearer. 

32.  I.  First.  All  wealth  is  intrinsic,  and  is  not  constituted 
by  the  judgment  of  men.  This  is  easily  seen  in  the  case  of 
things  affecting  the  body  ;  we  know,  that  no  force  of  fantasy 
will  make  stones  nourishing,  or  poison  innocent ;  but  it  is  less 
apparent  in  things  affecting  the  mind.  We  are  easily — per- 
haps willingly — misled  by  the  appearance  of  beneficial  results 
obtained  by  industries  addressed  wholly  to  the  gratification 
of  fanciful  desire  ;  and  apt  to  suppose  that  whatever  is  widely 
coveted,  dearly  bought,  and  pleasurable  in  possession,  must 
be  included  in  our  definition  of  wealth.  It  is  the  more  diffi- 
cult to  quit  ourselves  of  this  error  because  many  things  which 
are  true  wealth  in  moderate  use,  become  false  wealth  in  im- 
moderate ;  and  many  things  are  mixed  of  good  and  evil, — as 
mostly,  books,  and  works  of  art, — out  of  which  one  person 
will  get  the  good,  and  another  the  evil ;  so  that  it  seems  as  if 


126 


MUNERA  FULVER1S. 


there  were  no  fixed  good  or  evil  in  the  things  themselves,  but 
only  in  the  view  taken,  and  use  made  of  them. 

But  that  is  not  so.  The  evil  and  good  are  fixed ;  in  es- 
sence, and  in  proportion.  And  in  things  in  which  evil  de- 
pends upon  excess,  the  point  of  excess,  though  indefinable,  is 
fixed  ;  and  the  power  of  the  thing  is  on  the  hither  side  for 
good,  and  on  the  farther  side  for  evil.  And  in  all  cases  this 
power  is  inherent,  not  dependent  on  opinion  or  choice.  Our 
thoughts  of  things  neither  make,  nor  mar  their  eternal  force  ; 
nor — which  is  the  most  serious  point  for  future  consideration 
— can  they  prevent  the  effect  of  it  (within  certain  limits)  upon 
ourselves. 

33.  Therefore,  the  object  of  any  special  analysis  of  wealth 
will  be  not  so  much  to  enumerate  what  is  serviceable,  as  to 
distinguish  what  is  destructive  ;  and  to  show  that  it  is  inevi- 
tably destructive  ;  that  to  receive  pleasure  from  an  evil  thing 
is  not  to  escape  from,  or  alter  the  evil  of  it,  but  to  be  altered 
by  it ;  that  is,  to  suffer  from  it  to  the  utmost,  having  our  own 
nature,  in  that  degree,  made  evil  also.  And  it  may  be  shown 
farther,  that,  through  whatever  length  of  time  or  subtleties  of 
connexion  the  harm  is  accomplished,  (being  also  less  or  more 
according  to  the  fineness  and  worth  of  the  humanity  on  which 
it  is  wrought),  still,  nothing  but  harm  ever  comes  of  a  bad 
thing. 

34.  So  that,  in  sum,  the  term  wealth  is  never  to  be  attached 
to  the  accidental  object  of  a  morbid  desire,  but  only  to  the  con- 
slant  object  of  a  legitimate  one*  By  the  fury  of  ignorance, 
and  fitfulness  of  caprice,  large  interests  may  be  continually 
attached  to  things  unserviceable  or  hurtful ;  if  their  nature 
could  be  altered  by  our  passions,  the  science  of  Political  Econ- 
omy would  remain,  what  it  has  been  hitherto  among  us,  the 
weighing  of  clouds,  and  the  portioning  out  of  shadows.  But 
of  ignorance  there  is  no  science  ;  and  of  caprice  no  law.  Their 
disturbing  forces  interfere  with  the  operations  of  faithful 

[*  Remember  carefully  this  statement,  that  Wealth  consists  only  in 
the  things  which  the  nature  of  humanity  has  rendered  in  all  ages,  and 
must  render  in  all  ages  to  come,  (that  is  what  T  meant  by  il  constant"), 
the  objects  of  legitimate  desire.    And  see  Appendix  XL] 


MUNERA  PULVEEIS. 


127 


Economy,  but  have  nothing  in  common  with  them  :  she,  the 
calm  arbiter  of  national  destiny,  regards  only  essential  power 
for  good  in  all  that  she  accumulates,  and  alike  disdains  the 
wanderings  *  of  imagination,  and  the  thirsts  of  disease. 

35.  II.  Secondly.  The  assertion  that  wealth  is  not  only  in- 
trinsic, but  dependent,  in  order  to  become  effectual,  on  a  given 
degree  of  vital  power  in  its  possessor,  is  opposed  to  another 
popular  view  of  wealth  ; — namely,  that  though  it  may  always  be 
constituted  by  caprice,  it  is,  when  so  constituted,  a  substantial 
thing,  of  which  given  quantities  may  be  counted  as  existing 
here,  or  there,  and  exchangeable  at  rated  prices. 

In  this  view  there  are  three  errors.  The  first  and  chief  is 
the  overlooking  the  fact  that  all  exchangeableness  of  commod- 
ity, or  effective  demand  for  it,  depends  on  the  sum  of  capacity 
for  its  use  existing,  here  or  elsewhere.  The  book  we  cannot 
read,  or  picture  we  take  no  delight  in,  may  indeed  be  called 
part  of  our  wealth,  in  so  far  as  wre  have  power  of  exchanging 
either  for  something  we  like  better.  But  our  power  of  effect- 
ing such  exchange,  and  yet  more,  of  effecting  it  to  advantage, 
depends  absolutely  on  the  number  of  accessible  persons  who 
can  understand  the  boc  k,  or  enjoy  the  painting,  and  who  will 
dispute  the  possession  of  them.  Thus  the  actual  worth  of 
either,  even  to  us,  depends  no  more  on  their  essential  good- 
ness than  on  the  capacity  existing  somewhere  for  the  perception 
cf  it ;  and  it  is  vain  in  any  completed  system  of  production  to 
think  of  obtaining  one  without  the  other.  So  that,  though 
the  true  political  economist  knows  that  co-existence  of  capac- 
ity  for  use  with  temporary  possession  cannot  be  always  se- 
cured, the  final  fact,  on  which  he  bases  all  action  and  admin- 
istration, is  that,  in  the  whole  nation,  or  group  of  nations,  he 
has  to  deal  with,  for  every  atom  of  intrinsic  value  produced 
he  must  with  exactest  chemistry  produce  its  twin  atom  of  ac- 
ceptant  digestion,  or  understanding  capacity  ;  or,  in  the  de- 
gree of  his  failure,  he  has  no  wealth.  Nature's  challenge  to 
us  is,  in  earnest,  as  the  Assyrians  mock  ;  "I  will  give  thee 
two  thousand  horses,  if  thou  be  able  on  thy  part  to  set  riders 

[*  The  Wanderinas,  observe,  not  the  Right  goings,  of  Jm agin ati oil 
£he  is  very  far  from  despising  these,] 


128 


MUNERA  PULVER18. 


upon  them."  Bavieca's  paces  are  brave,  if  the  Cid  backs 
him  ;  but  woe  to  us,  if  we  take  the  dust  of  capacity,  wearing 
the  armour  of  it,  for  capacity  itself,  for  so  all  procession,  how- 
ever goodly  in  the  show  of  it,  is  to  the  tomb. 

38.  The  second  error  in  this  popular  view  of  wealth  is,  that 
in  giving  the  name  of  wealth  to  things  which  wTe  cannot  use, 
we  in  reality  confuse  wealth  with  money.  The  land  we  have 
no  skill  to  cultivate,  the  book  which  is  sealed  to  us,  or  dress 
which  is  superfluous,  may  indeed  be  exchangeable,  but  as 
such  are  nothing  more  than  a  cumbrous  form  of  bank-note,  of 
doubtful  or  slow  convertibility.  As  long  as  we  retain  pos- 
session of  them,  we  merely  keep  our  bank-notes  in  the  shape 
of  gravel  or  clay,  of  book-leaves,  or  of  embroidered  tissue. 
Circumstances  may,  perhaps,  render  such  forms  the  safest, 
or  a  certain  complacency  may  attach  to  the  exhibition  of 
them  ;  into  both  these  advantages  we  shall  inquire  after- 
wards ;  I  wish  the  reader  only  to  observe  here,  that  exchange- 
able property  which  we  cannot  use  is,  to  us  personally,  merely 
one  of  the  forms  of  money,  not  of  wealth. 

37.  The  third  error  in  the  popular  view  is  the  confusion  of 
Guardianship  with  Possession  ;  the  real  state  of  men  of  prop- 
erty being,  too  commonly,  that  of  curators,  not  possessors, 
of  wealth. 

A  man's  power  over  his  property  is  at  the  widest  range  of 
it,  fivefold  ;  it  is  power  of  Use,  for  himself,  Administration,  to 
others,  Ostentation,  Destruction,  or  Bequest :  and  possession 
is  in  use  only,  which  for  each  man  is  sternly  limited ;  so  that 
such  things,  and  so  much  of  them  as  he  can  use,  are,  indeed, 
well  for  him,  or  Wealth ;  and  more  of  them,  or  any  other 
things,  are  ill  for  him,  or  Illth.*  Plunged  to  the  lips  in 
Orinoco,  he  shall  drink  to  his  thirst  measure  ;  more,  at  his 
peril :  with  a  thousand  oxen  on  his  lands,  he  shall  eat  to  his 
hunger  measure  ;  more,  at  his  peril.  He  cannot  live  in  two 
houses  at  once  ;  a  few  bales  of  silk  or  wool  will  suffice  for  the 
fabric  of  all  the  clothes  he  can  ever  wear,  and  a  few  books 
will  probably  hold  all  the  furniture  good  for  his  brain.  Be- 
yond these,  in  the  best  of  us  but  narrow,  capacities,  we  have 
*  See  Appendix  TIL 


MVNERA  PULVERIS. 


129 


but  the  power  of  administering,  or  wiaZ-administering,  wealth : 
(that  is  to  say,  distributing,  lending,  or  increasing  it) ; — of  ex- 
hibiting it  (as  in  magnificence  of  retinue  or  furniture),— of 
destroying,  or,  finally,  of  bequeathing  it.  And  with  multi- 
tudes of  rich  men,  administration  degenerates  into  curator- 
ship  ;  they  merely  hold  their  property  in  charge,  as  Trustees, 
for  the  benefit  of  some  person  or  persons  to  whom  it  is  to  be 
delivered  upon  their  death  ;  and  the  position,  explained  in 
clear  terms,  would  hardly  seem  a  covetable  one.  What 
would  be  the  probable  feelings  of  a  youth,  on  his  entrance 
into  life,  to  whom  the  career  hoped  for  him  was  proposed  in 
terms  such  as  these  :  "  You  must  work  unremittingly,  and 
with  your  utmost  intelligence,  during  all  your  available  years, 
you  will  thus  accumulate  wealth  to  a  large  amount ;  but  you 
must  touch  none  of  it,  beyond  what  is  needful  for  your  sup- 
port. Whatever  sums  you  gain,  beyond  those  required  for 
your  decent  and  moderate  maintenance,  and  whatever  beauti- 
ful things  you  may  obtain  possession  of,  shall  be  properly 
taken  care  of  by  servants,  for  whose  maintenance  you  will  be 
charged,  and  whom  you  will  have  the  trouble  of  superintend- 
ing, and  on  your  death-bed  you  shall  have  the  power  of  de- 
termining to  whom  the  accumulated  property  shall  belong,  or 
to  what  purposes  be  applied. " 

38.  The  labour  of  life,  under  such  conditions,  would  prob- 
ably be  neither  zealous  nor  cheerful ;  yet  the  only  difference 
between  this  position  and  that  of  the  ordinary  capitalist  is  the 
power  which  the  latter  supposes  himself  to  possess,  and  which 
is  attributed  to  him  by  others,  of  spending  his  money  at  any 
moment.  This  pleasure,  taken  in  the  imagination  of  power  to 
part  with  that  with  which  we  have  no  intention  of  parting,  is  one 
of  the  most  curious,  though  commonest  forms  of  the  Eidolon, 
or  Phantasm  of  Wealth.  But  the  political  economist  has 
nothing  to  do  with  this  idealism,  and  looks  only  to  the  practi- 
cal issue  of  it— namely,  that  the  holder  of  wealth,  in  such 
temper,  may  be  regarded  simply  as  a  mechanical  means  of 
collection  ;  or  as  a  money-chest  with  a  slit  in  it,  not  only  re- 
ceptant  but  suctional,  set  in  the  public  thoroughfare  ; — chest 
of  which  only  Death  has  the  key,  and  evil  Chance  the  distri- 


M  UN  ERA  PULVER1S. 


bulion  of  the  contents.  In  his  function  of  Lender  (which, 
however;  is  one  of  administration,  not  use,  as  far  as  he  is  him- 
self concerned),  the  capitalist  takes,  indeed,  a  more  interest- 
ing  aspect ;  but  even  in  that  function,  his  relations  with  the 
state  are  apt  to  degenerate  into  a  mechanism  for  the  conven- 
ient contraction  of  debt ; — a  function  the  more  mischievous, 
because  a  nation  invariably  appeases  its  conscience  with  re- 
spect to  an  unjustifiable  expense,  by  meeting  it  with  borrowed 
funds,  expresses  its  repentance  of  a  foolish  piece  of  business, 
by  letting  its  tradesmen  wait  for  their  money,  and  always 
leaves  its  descendants  to  pay  for  the  work  which  will  be  of 
the  least  advantage  to  them.* 

39.  Quit  of  these  three  sources  of  misconception,  the 
reader  will  have  little  farther  difficulty  in  apprehending  the 
real  nature  of  Effectual  value.  He  may,  however,  at  first  not 
without  surprise,  perceive  the  consequences  involved  in  his 
acceptance  of  the  definition.  For  if  the  actual  existence  of 
wealth  be  dependent  on  the  power  of  its  possessor,  it  follows 
that  the  sum  of  wealth  held  by  the  nation,  instead  of  being- 
constant,  or  calculable,  varies  hourly,  nay,  momentarily,  with 
the  number  and  character  of  its  holders  !  and  that  in  chang- 
ing hands,  it  changes  in  quantity.  And  farther,  since  the 
worth  of  the  currency  is  proportioned  to  the  sum  of  material 
wealth  which  it  represents,  if  the  sum  of  the  wealth  changes, 
the  worth  of  the  currency  changes.  And  thus  both  the  sum 
of  the  property,  and  power  of  the  currency,  of  the  state,  vary 
momentarily  as  the  character  and  number  of  the  holders. 
And  not  only  so,  but  different  rates  and  kinds  of  variation 
are  caused  by  the  character  cf  the  holders  of  different  kinds 
of  wealth.  The  transitions  of  value  caused  by  the  character 
of  the  holders  of  land  differ  in  mode  from  those  caused  by 
character  in  holders  of  works  of  art ;  and  these  again  from 
those  caused  by  character  in  holders  of  machinery  or  other 
working  capital.    But  we  cannot  examine  these  special  phe- 

[*  I  would  beg  the  reader's  very  close  attention  to  these  37th  and 
38th  paragraphs.  It  would  be  well  if  a  dogged  conviction  could  be  en 
forced  on  nations,  as  on  individuals,  that,  with  few  exceptions,  wha* 
they  cannot  at  present  pay  for,  they  should  not  at  present  have.] 


M  UN  ERA  PULVER1S. 


131 


fiomena  of  any  kind  of  wealth  until  we  have  a  clear  idea  of 
the  way  in  which  true  currency  expresses  them  ;  and  of  the 
resulting  modes  in  which  the  cost  and  price  of  any  article  are 
related  to  its  value.  To  obtain  this  we  must  approach  the 
subject  in  its  first  elements. 

40.  Let  us  suppose  a  national  store  of  wealth,  composed  of 
material  things  either  useful,  or  believed  to  be  so,  taken  charge 
of  by  the  Government,*  and  that  every  workman,  having  pro- 
duced any  article  involving  labour  in  its  prod  action,  and  for 
which  he  has  no  immediate  use,  brings  it  to  add  to  this  store, 
receiving  from  the  Government,  in  exchange,  an  order  either 
for  the  return  of  the  thing  itself,  or  of  its  equivalent  in  other 
things,  such  as  he  may  choose  out  of  the  store,  at  any  time 
when  he  needs  them.  The  question  of  equivalence  itself 
(how  much  wine  a  man  is  to  receive  in  return  for  so  much 
corn,  or  how  much  coal  in  return  for  so  much  iron)  is  a  quite 
separate  one,  which  we  will  examine  presently.  For  the  time, 
let  it  be  assumed  that  this  equivalence  has  been  determined, 
and  that  the  Government  order,  in  exchange  for  a  fixed  weight 
of  any  article  (called,  suppose  a),  is  either  for  the  return  of 
that  weight  of  the  article  itself,  or  of  another  fixed  weight  of 
the  article  b,  or  another  of  the  article  c,  and  so  on. 

Now,  supposing  that  the  labourer  speedily  and  continu- 
ally presents  these  general  orders,  or,  in  common  language, 
"  spends  the  money,"  he  has  neither  changed  the  circum- 
stances of  the  nation,  nor  his  own,  except  in  so  far  as  he  may 
have  produced  useful  and  consumed  useless  articles,  or  vice 
versa.  But  if  he  does  not  use,  or  uses  in  part  only,  the  orders 
he  receives,  and  lays  aside  some  portion  of  them  ;  and  thus 
every  day  bringing  his  contribution  to  the  national  store,  lays 
by  some  per-centage  of  the  orders  received  in  exchange  for  it, 
he  increases  the  national  wealth  daily  by  as  much  as  he  does 
not  use  of  the  received  order,  and  to  the  same  amount  accu- 
mulates a  monetary  claim  on  the  Government.  It  is,  of  course, 
always  in  his  power,  as  it  is  his  legal  right,  to  bring  forward 
this  accumulation  of  claim,  and  at  once  to  consume,  destroy, 
or  distribute,  the  sum  of  his  wealth.  Supposing  he  neve* 
*  See  Appendix  IV. 


132 


MVNERA  PULVERIS. 


does  so,  but  dies,  leaving  his  claim  to  others,  he  has  enriched 
the  State  during  his  life  by  the  quantity  of  wealth  over  which 
that  claim  extends,  or  has,  in  other  words,  rendered  so  much 
additional  life  possible  in  the  State,  of  which  additional  life 
he  bequeaths  the  immediate  possibility  to  those  whom  he  in- 
vests with  his  claim.  Supposing  him  to  cancel  the  claim,  he- 
would  distribute  this  possibility  of  life  among  the  nation  at 
large. 

41.  We  hitherto  consider  the  Government  itself  as  simply 
a  conservative  power,  taking  charge  of  the  wealth  entrusted 
to  it. 

But  a  Government  may  be  more  or  less  than  a  conservative 
power.    It  may  be  either  an  improving,  or  destructive  one. 

If  it  be  an  improving  power,  using  all  the  wealth  entrusted 
to  it  to  the  best  advantage,  the  nation  is  enriched  in  root  and 
branch  at  once,  and  the  Government  is  enabled,  for  every 
order  presented,  to  return  a  quantity  of  wealth  greater  than 
the  order  was  written  for,  according  to  the  fructification  ob- 
tained in  the  interim.  This  ability  may  be  either  concealed, 
in  which  case  the  currency  does  not  completely  represent  the 
wealth  of  the  country,  or  it  may  be  manifested  by  the  contin- 
ual payment  of  the  excess  of  value  on  each  order,  in  which 
case  there  is  (irrespectively,  observe,  of  collateral  results  after- 
wards to  be  examined)  a  perpetual  rise  in  the  worth  of  the 
currency,  that  is  to  say,  a  fall  in  the  price  of  all  articles  repre- 
sented by  it. 

42.  But  if  the  Government  be  destructive,  or  a  consuming 
power,  it  becomes  unable  to  return  the  value  received  on  the 
presentation  of  the  order. 

This  inability  may  either  be  concealed  by  meeting  demands 
to  the  full,  until  it  issue  in  bankruptcy,  or  in  some  form  of 
national  debt ; — or  it  may  be  concealed  during  oscillatory 
movements  between  destructiveness  and  productiveness,  which 
result  on  the  whole  in  stability  ; — or  it  may  be  manifested  by 
the  consistent  return  of  less  than  value  received  on  each  pre- 
sented order,  in  which  case  there  is  a  consistent  fall  in  the 
worth  of  the  currency,  or  rise  in  the  price  of  the  things  repre» 
rented  by  it 


MUNEEA  PULVERIS. 


133 


43.  Now,  if  for  this  conception  of  a  central  Government, 
we  substitute  that  of  a  body  of  persons  occupied  in  industrial 
pursuits,  of  whom  each  adds  in  his  private  capacity  to  the 
common  store,  we  at  once  obtain  an  approximation  to  the 
actual  condition  of  a  civilized  mercantile  community,  from 
which  approximation  we  might  easily  proceed  into  still  com- 
pleter analysis.  I  purpose,  however,  to  arrive  at  every  result 
by  the  gradual  expansion  of  the  simpler  conception  ;  but  I 
wish  the  reader  to  observe,  in  the  meantime,  that  both  the 
social  conditions  thus  supposed  (and  I  will  by  anticipation  say 
also,  all  possible  social  conditions),  agree  in  two  great  points  ; 
namely,  in  the  primal  importance  of  the  supposed  national 
store  or  stock,  and  in  its  destructibility  or  improveability  by 
the  holders  of  it. 

44.  I.  Observe  that  in  both  conditions,  that  of  central 
Government-holding,  and  diffused  private-holding,  the  quan- 
tity of  stock  is  of  the  same  national  moment.  In  the  one 
case,  indeed,  its  amount  may  be  known  by  examination  of 
the  persons  to  whom  it  is  confided  ;  in  the  other  it  cannot  be 
known  but  by  exposing  the  private  affairs  of  every  individual. 
But,  known  or  unknown,  its  significance  is  the  same  under 
each  condition.  The  riches  of  the  nation  consist  in  the 
abundance,  and  their  wealth  depends  on  the  nature,  of  this 
store. 

45.  II.  In  the  second  place,  both  conditions,  (and  all  other 
possible  ones)  agree  in  the  destructibility  or  improveability 
of  the  store  by  its  holders.  Whether  in  private  hands,  or 
under  Government  charge,  the  national  store  may  be  daily 
consumed,  or  daily  enlarged,  by  its  possessors ;  and  while 
the  currency  remains  apparently  unaltered,  the  property  it 
represents  may  diminish  or  increase. 

46.  The  first  question,  then,  which  we  have  to  put  under 
our  simple  conception  of  central  Government,  namely,  "What 
store  has  it  ?  "  is  one  of  equal  importance,  whatever  may  be 
the  constitution  of  the  State  ;  while  the  second  question- 
namely,  "  Who  are  the  holders  of  the  store  ?  "  involves  the 
discussion  of  the  constitution  of  the  State  itself. 

The  first  inquiry  .resolves  itself  into  three  heads : 


13* 


MUNERA  PULVE11IS. 


1.  What  is  the  nature  of  the  store  ? 

2.  What  is  its  quantity  in  relation  to  the  population  ? 

3.  What  is  its  quantity  in  relation  to  the  currency  ? 
The  second  inquiry  into  two  : 

1.  Who  are  the  Holders  of  the  store,  and  in  what  propor* 
tions  ? 

2.  Who  are  the  Claimants  of  the  store,  (that  is  to  say,  the 
holders  of  the  currency, )  and  in  what  proportions  ? 

We  will  examine  the  range  of  the  first  three  questions  in 
the  present  paper  ;  of  the  twro  following,  in  the  sequel. 

47.  L  Question  First.  What  is  the  nature  of  the  store  ? 
Has  the  nation  hitherto  worked  for  and  gathered  the  right 
thing  or  the  wrong  ?  On  that  issue  rest  the  possibilities  of 
its  life. 

For  example,  let  us  imagine  a  society,  of  no  great  extent, 
occupied  in  procuring  and  laying  up  store  of  corn,  wine, 
wool,  silk,  and  other  such  preservable  materials  of  food  and 
clothing  ;  and  that  it  has  a  currency  representing  them. 
Imagine  farther,  that  on  days  of  festivity,  the  society,  discov- 
ering itself  to  derive  satisfaction  from  pyrotechnics,  gradually 
turns  its  attention  more  and  more  to  the  manufacture  of  gun- 
powder ;  so  that  an  increasing  number  of  labourers,  giving 
what  time  they  can  spare  to  this  branch  of  industry,  bring  in- 
creasing quantities  of  combustibles  into  the  store,  and  use 
the  general  orders  received  in  exchange  to  obtain  such  wine, 
wool,  or  corn,  as  they  may  have  need  of.  The  currency  re- 
mains the  same,  and  represents  precisely  the  same  amount  of 
material  in  the  store,  and  of  labour  spent  in  producing  it.  But 
the  corn  and  wine  gradually  vanish,  and  in  their  place,  as  gradu- 
ally, appear  sulphur  and  saltpetre,  till  at  last  the  labourers 
who  have  consumed  corn  and  supplied  nitre,  presenting  on  a 
festal  morning  some  of  their  currency  to  obtain  materials  for 
the  feast,  discover  that  no  amount  of  currency  will  command 
anything  Festive,  except  Fire.  The  supply  of  rockets  is  un- 
limited, but  that  of  food,  limited,  in  a  quite  final  manner  ; 
and  the  whole  currency  in  the  hands  of  the  society  repre- 
sents an  infinite  power  of  detonation,  but  none  of  existence. 

48.  This  statement,  caricatured  as  it  may  seem,  is  only  ex- 


MUNEBA  PULVERIS. 


135 


aggeratcd  in  assuming  the  persistence  of  the  folly  to  extrem- 
ity, unchecked,  as  in  reality  it  would  be,  by  the  gradual  rise 
in  price  of  food.  But  it  falls  short  of  the  actual  facts  of 
human  life  in  expression  of  the  depth  and  intensity  of  the 
folly  itself.  For  a  great  part  (the  reader  would  not  believe 
how  great  until  he  saw  the  statistics  in  detail)  of  the  most 
earnest  and  ingenious  industry  of  the  world  is  spent  in  pro- 
ducing munitions  of  war  ;  gathering,  that  is  to  say  the  mate- 
rials, not  of  festive,  but  of  consuming  fire  ;  filling  its  stores 
with  all  })ower  of  the  instruments  of  pain,  and  all  affluence  of 
the  ministries  of  death.  It  was  no  true  Trionfo  delta  Morte* 
which  men  have  seen  and  feared  (sometimes  scarcely  feared) 
so  long  ;  wherein  he  brought  them  rest  from  their  labours. 
We  see,  and  share,  another  and  higher  form  of  his  triumph 
now.  Task-master,  instead  of  Releaser,  he  rules  the  dust  of 
the  arena  no  less  than  of  the  tomb  ;  and,  content  once  in  the 
grave  whither  man  went,  to  make  his  works  to  cease  and  his 
devices  to  vanish, — now,  in  the  busy  city  and  on  the  service- 
able sea,  makes  his  work  to  increase,  and  his  devices  to  mul- 
tiply. 

49.  To  this  doubled  loss,  or  negative  power  of  labour, 
spent  in  producing  means  of  destruction,  we  have  to  add,  in 
our  estimate  of  the  consequences  of  human  folly,  whatever 
more  insidious  waste  of  toil  there  is  in  production  of  unnec- 
essary luxury.  Such  and  such  an  occupation  (it  is  said)  sup- 
ports so  many  labourers,  because  so  many  obtain  wages  in 
following  it ;  but  it  is  never  considered  that  unless  there  be  a 
supporting  power  in  the  product  of  the  occupation,  the  wages 
given  to  one  man  are  merely  withdrawn  from  another.  We 
cannot  say  of  any  trade  that  it  maintains  such  and  such  a 
number  of  persons,  unless  we  know  how  and  where  the 
money,  now  spent  in  the  purchase  of  its  produce,  would  have 
been  spent,  if  that  produce  had  not  been  manufactured.  The 
purchasing  funds  truly  support  a  number  of  people  in  making 

[*  I  little  thought,  what  Trionfo  della  Morte  would  be,  for  tin's  very 
cause,  and  in  literal  fulfilment  of  the  closing  words  of  the  47th  para- 
graph, over  the  fields  and  houses  of  Europe,  and  over  its  fairest  city — 
within  seven  years  from  the  day  I  wrote  it.] 


136 


M  UN  ERA  PULVER1S. 


This ;  but  (probably)  leave  unsupported  an  equal  number  who 
are  making,  or  could  have  made  That.  The  manufacturers 
of  small  watches  thrive  at  Geneva  ; — it  is  well  ; — but  where 
would  the  money  spent  on  small  watches  have  gone,  had 
there  been  no  small  watches  to  buy  ? 

50.  If  the  so  frequently  uttered  aphorism  of  mercantile 
economy — "  labour  is  limited  by  capital,"  were  true,  this  ques- 
tion would  be  a  definite  one.  But  it  is  untrue  ;  and  that 
widely.  Out  of  a  given  quantity  of  funds  for  wages,  more  or 
less  labour  is  to  be  had,  according  to  the  quantity  of  will  with 
which  we  can  inspire  the  workman  ;  and  the  true  limit  of 
labour  is  only  in  the  limit  of  this  moral  stimulus  of  the  will, 
and  of  the  bodily  power.  In  an  ultimate,  but  entirely  unprac- 
tical sense,  labour  is  limited  by  capital,  as  it  is  by  matter — 
that  is  to  say,  where  there  is  no  material,  there  can  be  no 
work, — but  in  the  practical  sense,  labour  is  limited  only  by 
the  great  original  capital  of  head,  heart,  and  hand.  Even  in 
the  most  artificial  relations  of  commerce,  labour  is  to  capital 
as  fire  to  fuel :  out  of  so  much  fuel,  you  can  have  only  so  much 
fire  ;  but  out  of  so  much  fuel,  you  shall  have  so  much  fire, — 
not  in  proportion  to  the  mass  of  combustible,  but  to  the  force 
of  wind  that  fans  and  water  that  quenches ;  and  the  appliance 
of  both.  And  labour  is  furthered,  as  conflagration  is,  not  so 
much  by  added  fuel,  as  by  admitted  air.* 

51.  For  which  reasons,  I  had  to  insert,  in  §  49,  the  qualify- 
ing "  probably  for  it  can  never  be  said  positively  that  the 
purchase-money,  or  wages  fund  of  any  trade  is  withdrawn  from 
some  other  trade.  The  object  itself  may  be  the  stimulus  of 
the  production  of  the  money  which  buys  it ;  that  is  to  say,  the 
work  by  which  the  purchaser  obtained  the  means  of  buying 
it,  would  not  have  been  done  by  him  unless  he  had  wanted 
that  particular  thing.  And  the  production  of  any  article  not 
intrinsically  (nor  in  the  process  of  manufacture)  injurious,  is 

[*  The  meaning  of  which  is,  that  you  may  spend  a  great  deal  of 
money,  and  get  very  little  work  for  it,  and  that  little  bad  ;  but  having 
good  "  air  "  or  "  spirit,"  to  put  life  into  it,  with  very  little  money,  you 
may  get  a  great  deal  of  work,  and  all  good  ;  which,  observe,  is  an  aritfr 
metical,  not  at  all  a  poetical  or  visionary  circumstance.] 


HUN  ERA  PULVEM8., 


137 


useful,  if  the  desire  of  it  causes  productive  labour  in  other 
directions. 

52.  In  the  national  store,  therefore,  the  presence  of  things 
intrinsically  valueless  does  not  imply  an  entirely  correlative 
absence  of  things  valuable.  We  cannot  be  certain  that  all  the 
labour  spent  on  vanity  has  been  diverted  from  reality,  and 
that  for  every  bad  thing  produced,  a  precious  thing  has  been 
lost.  In  great  measure,  the  vain  things  represent  the  results 
of  roused  indolence  ;  they  have  been  carved,  as  toys,  in  extra 
time  ;  and,  if  they  had  not  been  made,  nothing  else  would 
have  been  made.  Even  to  munitions  of  war  this  principle  ap- 
plies ;  they  partly  represent  the  work  of  men  who,  if  they  had 
not  made  spears,  would  never  have  made  pruning  hooks,  and 
who  are  incapable  of  any  activities  but  those  of  contest. 

53.  Thus  then,  finally,  the  nature  of  the  store  has  to  be  con- 
sidered under  two  main  lights  ;  the  one,  that  of  its  immediate 
and  actual  utility  ;  the  other,  that  of  the  past  national  char- 
acter which  it  signifies  by  its  production,  and  future  character 
which  it  must  devolop  by  its  use.  And  the  issue  of  this  in- 
vestigation will  be  to  show  us  that 

Economy  does  not  depend  merely  on  principles  of  "  demand 
and  supply,"  but  primarily  on  what  is  demanded,  and  what  is 
supplied  ;  which  I  will  beg  of  you  to  observe,  and  take  to 
heart. 

54.  II.  Question  Second. — What  is  the  quantity  of  the  store, 
in  relation  to  the  population  ? 

It  follows  from  what  has  been  already  stated  that  the  accu- 
rate form  in  which  this  question  has  to  be  put  is — "  What 
quantity  of  each  article  composing  the  store  exists  in  propor- 
tion to  the  real  need  for  it  by  the  population  ?  "  But  we  shall 
for  the  time  assume,  in  order  to  keep  all  our  terms  at  the  sim- 
plest, that  the  store  is  wholly  composed  of  useful  articles,  and 
accurately  proportioned  to  the  several  needs  for  them. 

Now  it  cannot  be  assumed,  because  the  store  is  large  in 
proportion  to  the  number  of  the  people,  that  the  people  must 
be  in  comfort  ;  nor  because  it  is  small,  that  they  must  be 
in  distress.    An  active  and  economical  race  always  produces 


138 


MUNERA  PULVEIUS. 


more  than  it  requires,  and  lives  (if  it  is  permitted  to  do  so)  in 
competence  on  the  produce  of  its  daily  labour.  The  quantity 
of  its  store,  great  or  small,  is  therefore  in  many  respects  in- 
different to  it,  and  cannot  be  inferred  from  its  aspect.  Sim- 
ilarly an  inactive  and  wasteful  population,  which  cannot  live 
by  its  daily  labour,  but  is  dependent,  partly  or  wholly,  on 
consumption  of  its  store,  may  be  (by  various  difficulties,  here- 
after to  be  examined,  in  realizing  or  getting  at  such  store)  re- 
tained in  a  state  of  abject  distress,  though  its  possessions  may 
be  immense.  But  the  results  always  involved  in  the  magni- 
tude of  store  are,  the  commercial  power  of  the  nation,  its 
security,  and  its  mental  character.  Its  commercial  power,  in 
that  according  to  the  quantity  of  its  store,  may  be  the  extent 
oi  its  dealings  ;  its  security,  in  that  according  to  the  quantity 
of  its  store  are  its  means  of  sudden  exertion  or  sustained  en- 
durance ;  and  its  character,  in  that  certain  conditions  of  civili- 
zation cannot  be  attained  without  permanent  and  continually 
accumulating  store,  of  great  intrinsic  value,  and  of  peculiar 
nature.* 

55.  Now,  seeing  that  these  three  advantages  arise  from 
largeness  of  store  in  proportion  to  population,  the  question 
arises  immediately,  "  Given  the  store — is  the  nation  enriched 
by  diminution  of  its  numbers  ?  Are  a  successful  national  spec- 
ulation, and  a  pestilence,  economically  the  same  thing  ? 

This  is  in  part  a  sophistical  question  ;  such  as  it  would  be 
to  ask  whether  a  man  was  richer  when  struck  by  disease  which 
must  limit  his  life  within  a  predicable  period,  than  he  was 
when  in  health.  He  is  enabled  to  enlarge  his  current  ex- 
penses, and  has  for  all  purposes  a  larger  sum  at  his  imme- 
diate disposal  (for,  given  the  fortune,  the  shorter  the  life,  the 
larger  the  annuity) ;  yet  no  man  considers  himself  richer  be- 
cause he  is  condemned  by  his  physician. 

56.  The  logical  reply  is  that,  since  Wealth  is  by  definition 
only  the  means  of  life,  a  nation  cannot  be  enriched  by  its  own 
mortality.  Or  in  shorter  words,  the  life  is  more  than  the 
meat ;  and  existence  itself,  more  wealth  than  the  means  of  ex- 
istence.   Whence,  of  two  nations  who  have  equal  store,  the 

[*  More  especially,  works  of  great  art.] 


M  UN  ERA  PULVER1S. 


139 


more  numerous  is  to  be  considered  the  richer,  provided  the 
type  of  the  inhabitant  be  as  high  (for,  though  the  relative 
bulk  of  their  store  be  less,  its  relative  efficiency,  or  the  amount 
of  effectual  wealth,  must  be  greater).  But  if  the  type  of  the 
population  be  deteriorated  by  increase  of  its  numbers,  we 
have  evidence  of  poverty  in  its  worst  influence ;  and  then,  to 
determine  whether  the  nation  in  its  total  may  still  be  justifi- 
ably esteemed  rich,  we  must  set  or  weigh,  the  number  of  the 
poor  against  that  of  the  rich. 

To  effect  which  piece  of  scale-work,  it  is  of  course  necessary 
to  determine,  first,  who  are  poor  and  who  are  rich  ;  nor  this 
only,  but  also  how  poor  and  how  rich  they  are.  Which  will 
prove  a  curious  thermometrical  investigation  ;  for  we  shall 
have  to  do  for  gold  and  for  silver,  what  we  have  done  for 
quicksilver  ; — determine,  namely,  their  freezing-point,  their 
zero,  their  temperate  and  fever-heat  points ;  finally,  their 
vaporescent  point,  at  which  riches,  sometimes  explosively,  as 
lately  in  America,  "make  to  themselves  wings  — and  corre- 
spondency, the  number  of  degrees  below  zero  at  which  pov- 
erty, ceasing  to  brace  with  any  wholesome  cold,  burns  to  the 
bone.'* 

57.  For  the  performance  of  these  operations,  in  the  strict- 
est sense  scientific,  we  will  first  look  to  the  existing  so-called 
"  science  "  of  Political  Economy  ;  we  will  ask  it  to  define  for 
us  the  comparatively  and  superlatively  rich,  and  the  compara- 
tively and  superlatively  poor ;  and  on  its  own  terms — if  any 
terms  it  can  pronounce — examine,  in  our  prosperous  Eng- 
land, how  many  rich  and  how  many  poor  people  there  are  ; 
and  whether  the  quantity  and  intensity  of  the  poverty  is  in- 
deed so  overbalanced  by  the  quantity  and  intensity  of  wealth, 

[*  The  meaning  of  tnat,  in  plain  English,  is,  that  we  must  find  out 
how  far  poverty  and  riches  are  good  pr  bad  for  people,  and  what  is  the 
difference  between  being  miserably  poor — so  as,  perhaps,  to  be  driven 
to  crime,  or  to  pass  life  in  suffering — and  being  blessedly  poor,  in  the 
sense  meant  in  the  Sermon  on  the  Mount.  For  I  suppose  the  people 
who  believe  that  sermon,  do  not  think  (if  they  ever  honestly  ask  them- 
selves what  they  do  think),  either  that  Luke  vL  24.  is  a  merely  poetical 
exclamation,  or  that  the  Beatitude  of  Poverty  has  yet  been  attained  ia 
St.  Martin's  Lane  and  other  back  streets  of  London.] 


MUNEEA  PULVER1S. 


that  we  may  permit  ourselves  a  luxurious  blindness  to  it,  and 
call  ourselves,  complacently,  a  rich  country.  And  if  we  find 
no  clear  definition  in  the  existing  science,  we  will  endeavour 
for  ourselves  to  fix  the  true  degrees  of  the  scale,  and  to  apply 
them.* 

58.  Question  Third.  What  is  the  quantity  of  the  store  in 
relation  to  the  Currency? 

We  have  seen  that  the  real  worth  of  the  currency,  so  far  as 
dependent  on  its  relation  to  the  magnitude  of  the  store,  may 
vary,  within  certain  limits,  without  affecting  its  worth  in 
exchange.  The  diminution  or  increase  of  the  represented 
wealth  may  be  unperceived,  and  the  currency  may  be  taken 
either  for  more  or  less  than  it  is  truly  worth.  Usually  it  is 
taken  for  much  more  ;  and  its  power  in  exchange,  or  credit- 
power,  is  thus  increased  up  to  a  given  strain  upon  its  relation 
to  existing  wealth.  This  credit-power  is  of  chief  importance 
in  the  thoughts,  because  most  sharply  present  to  the  expe- 
rience, of  a  mercantile  community  :  but  the  conditions  of  its 
stability  f  and  all  other  relations  of  the  currency  to  the  mate- 

[*  Large  plans! — Eight  years  are  gone,  and  nothing  done  yet.  But  I 
keep  my  purpose  of  making  one  day  this  balance,  or  want  of  balance, 
visible,  in  those  so  seldom  used  scales  of  Justice.] 

f  These  are  nearly  all  briefly  represented  by  the  image  used  for  the 
force  of  money  by  Dante,  of  mast  and  sail :  — 

Quali  dal  vento  le  gonfiate  vele 
Oaggiono  avvolte,  poi  die  Talber  liacca 
Tal  cadde  a  terra  la  fiera  crudele. 

The  image  may  be  followed  oat,  like  all  of  Dante's,  into  as  close  de- 
tail as  the  reader  chooses.  Thus  the  stress  of  the  sail  must  be  propor- 
tioned to  the  strength  of  the  mast,  and  it  is  only  in  unforeseen  danger 
that  a  skilful  seaman  ever  carries  all  the  canvas  his  spars  will  bear  , 
states  of  mercantile  languor  are  like  the  flap  of  the  sail  in  a  calm  ;  of 
mercantile  precaution,  like  taking  in  reefs  ;  and  mercantile  ruin  is  in- 
stant on  the  breaking  of  the  mast. 

[I  mean  by  credit-power,  the  general  impression  on  the  national  mind 
that  a  sovereign,  or  any  other  coin,  is  worth  so  much  bread  and  cheese 
— so  much  wine— so  much  horse  and  carriage— or  so  much  fine  art:  it 
may  be  really  worth,  when  tried,  less  or  more  than  is  thought :  the 
thought  of  it  is  the  credit-power,] 


MUNERA  PULVEETR 


141 


rial  store  are  entirely  simple  in  principle,  if  not  in  action. 
Far  other  than  simple  are  the  relations  of  the  currency  to  the 
available  labour  which  it  also  represents.  For  this  relation  is 
involved  not  only  with  that  of  the  magnitude  of  the  store  to 
the  number,  but  with  that  of  the  magnitude  of  the  store  to 
the  mind,  of  the  population.  Its  proportion  to  their  number, 
and  the  resulting  worth  of  currency,  are  calculable  ;  but  its 
proportion  to  their  will  for  labour  is  not.  The  worth  of  the 
piece  of  money  which  claims  a  given  quantity  of  the  store  is, 
in  exchange,  less  or  greater  according  to  the  facility  of  ob- 
taining the  same  quantity  of  the  same  thing  without  having 
recourse  to  the  store.  In  oflier  words  it  depends  on  the  im- 
mediate Cost  and  Price  of  the  thing.  We  must  now,  there- 
fore, complete  the  definition  of  these  terms. 

59.  All  cost  and  price  are  counted  in  Labour.  We  must 
know  first,  therefore,  what  is  to  be  counted  as  Labour. 

I  have  already  defined  labour  to  be  the  Contest  of  the  life 
of  man  with  an  opposite.  Literally,  it  is  the  quantity  of 
"  Lapse,"  loss,  or  failure  of  human  life,  caused  by  any  effort. 
It  is  usually  confused  with  effort  itself,  or  the  application  of 
power  (opera) ;  but  there  is  much  effort  which  is  merely  a 
mode  of  recreation,  or  of  pleasure.  The  most  beautiful  ac- 
tions of  the  human  body,  and  the  highest  results  of  the 
human  intelligence,  are  conditions,  or  achievements,  of  quite 
unlaborious, — nay,  of  recreative, — effort.  But  labour  is  the 
suffering  in  effort.  It  is  the  negative  quantity,  or  quantity  of 
de-feat,  which  has  to  be  counted  against  every  Feat,  and  of 
de-fect  which  has  to  be  counted  against  every  Fact,  or  Deed 
of  men.  In  brief,  it  is  "  that  quantity  of  our  toil  which  we 
die  in." 

We  might,  therefore,  d  priori,  conjecture  (as  we  shall  ulti- 
mately find),  that  it  cannot  be  bought,  nor  sold.  Everything 
else  is  bought  and  sold  for  Labour,  but  labour  itself  cannot 
be  bought  nor  sold  for  anything,  being  priceless.*    The  idea 

*  The  object  of  Political  Economy  is  not  to  buy,  nor  to  sell  labour, 
but  to  spare  it.  Every  attempt  to  buy  or  sell  it  is,  in  the  outcome,  in- 
effectual ;  so  far  as  successful,  it  is  not  sale,  but  Betrayal ;  and  the  pur- 
chase-money is  a  part  of  that  thirty  pieces  which  bought,  first  the  great 


142 


MUNERA  PULVERI8. 


that  it  is  a  commodity  to  be  bought  or  sold,  is  the  alpha  and 
omega  of  Politico-Economic  fallacy. 

60.  This  being  the  nature  of  labour,  the  "  Cost "  of  any- 
thing is  the  quantity  of  labour  necessary  to  obtain  it ; — the 
quantity  for  which,  or  at  which,  it  "  stands  "  (constat).  It  is 
literally  the  "  Constancy  "  of  the  thing; — you  rfiallwin  it — 
move  it — come  at  it,  for  no  less  than  this. 

Cost  is  measured  and  measurable  (using  the  accurate  Latin 
terms)  only  in  "  labour,"  not  in  "  opera.5'  *  It  does  not  matter 
how  much  work  a  thing  needs  to  produce  it ;  it  matters  only 
how  much  distress.  Generally  the  more  the  power  it  requires, 
the  less  the  distress  ;  so  that  the  noblest  works  of  man  cost 
less  than  the  meanest. 

True  labour,  or  spending  of  life,  is  either  of  the  body,  in 
fatigue  or  pain  ;  of  the  temper  or  heart  (as  in  perseverance  of 
search  for  things, — patience  in  waiting  for  them, — fortitude 
or  degradation  in  suffering  for  them,  and  the  like),  or  of  the 
intellect.  All  these  kinds  of  labour  are  supposed  to  be  in- 
cluded in  the  general  term,  and  the  quantity  of  labour  is  then 
expressed  by  the  time  it  lasts.  So  that  a  unit  of  labour  is 
"  an  hour's  work  "  or  a  day's  work,  as  we  may  determine,  f 

61.  Cost,  like  value,  is  both  intrinsic  and  effectual.  Intrin- 
sic cost  is  that  of  getting  the  thing  in  the  right  way  ;  effect- 

est  of  labours,  and  afterwards  the  burial-field  of  the  Stranger  ;  for  this 
purchase-money,  being  in  its  very  smallness  or  vileness  the  exactly 
measured  opposite  of  the  11  vilis  annona  amicorum,"  makes  all  men 
strangers  to  each  other. 

*  Cicero's  distinction,  il  sordidi  qusestus,  quorum  operce,  non  quorum 
artes  emuntur,"  admirable  in  principle,  is  inaccurate  in  expression,  be- 
cause Cicero  did  not  practically  know  how  much  operative  dexterity  is 
necessary  in  all  the  higher  arts  ;  but  the  cost  of  this  dexterity  is  incal- 
culable. Be  it  great  or  small,  the  "cost"  of  the  mere  perfectness  of 
touch  in  a  hammer-stroke  of  Donatello's,  or  a  pencil-touch  of  Correg- 
gio's,  is  inestimable  by  any  ordinary  arithmetic. 

[Old  notes,  these,  more  embarrassing  I  now  perceive,  than  elucida- 
tory;  but  right,  and  worth  retaining.] 

f  Only  observe,  as  some  labour  is  more  destructive  of  life  than  other 
labour,  the  hour  or  da]?  of  the  more  destructive  toil  is  supposed  to  in- 
clude proportionate  rest.  Though  men  do  not,  or  cannot,  usually  taker 
tuck  rest,  except  in  death. 


M  UN  En  A  PUL  VERTS. 


143 


ual  cost  is  that  of  getting  the  thing  in  the  way  we  set  about 
it.  But  intrinsic  cost  cannot  be  made  a  subject  of  analytical 
investigation,  being  only  partially  discoverable,  and  that  by 
long  experience.  Effectual  cost  is  all  that  the  political  Econ- 
omist can  deal  with  ;  that  is  to  say,  the  cost  of  the  thing  un- 
der existing  circumstances,  and  by  known  processes. 

Cost,  being  dependent  much  on  application  of  method5 
varies  with  the  quantity  of  the  thing  wanted,  and  with  the 
number  of  persons  who  work  for  it.  It  is  easy  to  get  a  little 
of  some  things,  but  difficult  to  get  much  ;  it  is  impossible  to 
get  some  things  with  few  hands,  but  easy  to  get  them  with 
many. 

62.  The  cost  and  value  of  things,  however  difficult  to  de- 
termine accurately,  are  thus  both  dependent  on  ascertainable 
physical  circumstances.** 

*  There  is,  therefore,  observe,,  no  such  thing  as  cheapness  (in  the 
common  use  of  that  term),  without  some  error  or  injustice.  A  thing  is 
said  to  be  cheap,  not  because  it  is  common,  but  because  it  is  supposed 
to  be  sold  under  its  worth.  Everything  has  its  proper  and  true  worth 
at  any  given  time,  in  relation  to  everything  else  ;  and  at  that  worth 
should  be  bought  and  sold.  If  sold  under  it,  it  is  cheap  to  the  buyer 
by  exactly  so  much  as  the  seller  loses,  and  no  more.  Putrid  meat,  at 
twopence  a  pound,  is  not  "cheaper"  than  wholesome  meat  at  seven- 
pence  a  pound ;  it  is  probably  much  dearer  ;  but  if,  by  watching  your 
opportunity,  you  can  get  the  wholesome  meat  for  sixpence  a  pound,  it 
is  cheaper  to  you  by  a  penny,  which  you  have  gained,  and  the  seller 
lias  lost.  The  present  rage  for  cheapness  is  either,  therefore,  simply 
and  literally  a  rage  for  badness  of  all  commodities,  or  it  is  aivattempt  to 
find  persons  whose  necessities  will  force  them  to  let  you  have  more  than 
you  should  for  your  money.  It  is  quite  easy  to  produce  such  persons, 
and  in  large  numbers  ;  for  the  more  distress  there  is  in  a  nation,  the 
more  cheapness  of  this  sort  you  can  obtain,  and  your  boasted  cheapness 
is  thus  merely  a  measure  of  the  extent  of  your  national  distress. 

There  is,  indeed,  a  condition  of  apparent  cheapness,  which  we  have 
some  right  to  be  triumphant  in  ;  namely,  the  real  reduction  in  cost  of 
articles  by  right  application  of  labour.  But  in  this  case  the  article  is 
only  cheap  with  reference  to  its  former  price  ;  the  so-called  cheapness 
is  only  our  expression  for  the  sensation  of  contrast  between  its  former 
and  existing  prices.  So  goon  as  the  new  methods  ox  producing  the  arti- 
cle are  established,  it  ceases  to  be  esteemed  either  cheap  or  dear,  at  the 
new  price,  as  at  the  old  one,  and  is  felt  to  be  cheap  only  when  accident 
enables  it  to  be  purchased  beneath  this  new  value.    And  it  is  no  ad- 


M  UN  ERA  PUL  VERTS. 


But  their  price  is  dependent  on  the  human  will. 

Such  and  such  a  thing  is  demonstrably  good  for  so  muck 
And  it  may  demonstrably  be  had  for  so  much. 

But  it  remains  questionable,  and  in  all  manner  of  ways 
questionable,  whether  I  choose  to  give  so  much.* 

This  choice  is  always  a  relative  one.  It  is  a  choice  to  give 
a  price  for  this,  rather  than  for  that ; — a  resolution  to  have 
the  thing,  if  getting  it  does  not  involve  the  loss  of  a  better 
thing.  Price  depends,  therefore,  not  only  on  the  cost  of  the 
commodity  itself,  but  on  its  relation  to  the  cost  of  every  other 
attainable  thing. 

vantage  to  produce  tlie  article  more  easily,  except  as  it  enables  you  to 
multiply  your  population.  Cheapness  of  this  kind  is  merely  the  dis- 
covery that  more  men  can  be  maintained  on  the  same  ground ;  and  the 
question  how  many  you  will  maintain  in  proportion  to  your  additional 
means,  remains  exactly  in  the  same  terms  that  it  did  before. 

A  form  of  immediate  cheapness  results,  however,  in  many  cases, 
without  distress,  from  the  labour  of  a  population  where  food  is  redun- 
dant, or  where  the  labour  by  which  the  food  is  produced  leaves  much 
idle  time  on  their  hands,  which  may  be  applied  to  the  production  of 
4 '  cheap  "  articles. 

All  such  phenomena  indicate  to  the  political  economist  places  where 
the  labour  is  unbalanced.  In  the  first  case,  the  just  balance  is  to  be 
effected  by  taking  labourers  from  the  spot  where  pressure  exists,  and 
sending  them  to  that  where  food  is  redundant.  In  the  second,  the 
cheapness  is  a  local  accident,  advantageous  to  the  local  purchaser,  disad- 
vantageous to  the  local  producer.  It  is  one  of  the  first  duties  of  com- 
merce to  extend  the  market,  and  thus  give  the  local  producer  his  full 
advantage. 

Cheapness  caused  by  natural  accidents  of  harvest,  weather,  &c,  is 
always  counterbalanced,  in  due  time,  by  natural  scarcity,  similarly 
caused.  It  is  the  part  of  wise  government,  and  healthy  commerce,  so 
to  provide  in  times  and  places  of  plenty  for  times  and  places  of  dearth, 
as  that  there  shall  never  be  waste,  nor  famine. 

Cheapness  caused  by  gluts  of  the  market  is  merely  a  disease  of 
clumsy  and  wanton  commerce. 

*  Price  has  been  already  defined  (p.  9)  to  be  the  quantity  of  labour 
which  the  possessor  of  a  thing  is  willing  to  take  for  it.  It  is  best  to 
consider  the  price  to  be  that  fixed  by  the  possessor,  because  the  posses- 
sor has  absolute  power  of  refusing  sale,  while  the  purchaser  has  no  ab- 
solute power  of  compelling  it ;  but  the  effectual  or  market  price  is  that 
at  which  their  estimates  coincide. 


MUNERA  PULVERI8. 


145 


Farther.  The  power  of  choice  is  also  a  relative  one.  It 
depends  not  merely  on  our  own  estimate  of  the  thing,  but  on 
everybody  else's  estimate  ;  therefore  on  the  number  and  forca 
of  the  will  of  the  concurrent  buyers,  and  on  the  existing  quan- 
tity of  the  thing  in  proportion  to  that  number  and  force. 

Hence  the  price  of  anything  depends  on  four  variables. 

(1.)  Its  cost. 

(2.)  Its  attainable  quantity  at  that  cost. 

(3.)  The  number  and  power  of  the  persons  who  want  it. 

(4.)  The  estimate  they  have  formed  of  its  desirableness. 

Its  value  only  affects  its  price  so  far  as  it  is  contemplated 
in  this  estimate  ;  perhaps,  therefore,  not  at  all. 

63.  Now,  in  order  to  show  the  manner  in  which  price  ia 
expressed  in  terms  of  a  currency,  we  must  assume  these  four 
quantities  to  be  known,  and  the  "  estimate  of  desirableness," 
commonly  called  the  Demand,  to  be  certain.  We  will  take 
the  number  of  persons  at  the  lowest.  Let  A  and  B  be  two 
labourers  who  "  demand,"  that  is  to  say,  have  resolved  to  la- 
bour for,  two  articles,  a  and  b.  Their  demand  for  these  arti- 
cles (if  the  reader  likes  better,  he  may  say  their  need)  is  to  be 
conceived  as  absolute,  their  existence  depending  on  the  get- 
ting these  two  things.  Suppose,  for  instance,  that  they  are 
bread  and  fuel,  in  a  cold  country,  and  let  a  represent  the 
least  quantity  of  bread,  and  b  tlie  least  quantity  of  fuel,  which 
will  support  a  man's  life  for  a  day.  Let  a  be  producible  by 
an  hour's  labour,  but  6  only  by  two  hours'  labour. 

Then  the  cost  of  a  is  one  hour,  and  of  b  two  (cost,  by  our 
definition,  being  expressible  in  terms  of  time).  If,  therefore, 
each  man  worked  both  for  his  corn  and  fuel,  each  would  have 
to  work  three  hours  a  day.  But  they  divide  the  labour  for  its 
greater  ease.*  Then  if  A  works  three  hours,  he  produces 
3a,  which  is  one  a  more  than  both  the  men  want.  And  if  B 
works  three  hours,  he  produces  only  1|  b,  or  half  of  b  less 
than  both  want.    But  if  A  work  three  hours  and  B  six,  A  has 

*  This  "  greater  ease  "  ought  to  be  allowed  for  by  a  diminution  in  the 
times  of  the  divided  work  ;  but  as  the  proportion  of  times  would  re- 
main the  same,  I  do  not  introduce  this  unnecessary  complexity  into  th# 
calculation. 


146 


MUNERA  PULVERIS. 


3  a,  and  B  has  3  b,  a  maintenance  in  the  right  proportion  fof 
both  for  a  day  and  half ;  so  that  each  might  take  half  a  day's 
rest.  Bat  as  B  has  worked  double  time,  the  whole  of  this 
day's  rest  belongs  in  equity  to  him.  Therefore  the  just  ex* 
change  should  be,  A  giving  two  a  for  one  b,  has  one  a  and  one 
b ; — maintenance  for  a  day.  B  giving  one  b  for  two  a,  has 
two  a  and  two  b  ;  maintenance  for  two  days. 

But  B  cannot  rest  on  the  second  day,  or  A  would  be  left 
without  the  article  which  B  produces.  Nor  is  there  any 
means  of  making  the  exchange  just,  unless  a  third  labourer  is 
called  in.  Then  one  workman,  A,  produces  a,  and  two,  B  and 
C,  produce  b  : — A,  working  three  hours,  has  three  a  ; — B, 
three  hours,  1^  b  ; — C,  three  hours,  1|-  b.  B  and  C  each  give 
half  of  b  for  a,  and  all  have  their  equal  daily  maintenance  foi 
equal  daily  work. 

To  carry  the  example  a  single  step  farther,  let  three  arti- 
cles, a,  b,  and  c  be  needed. 

Let  a  need  one  hour's  work,  b  two,  and  c  four  ;  then  the 
day's  work  must  be  seven  hours,  and  one  man  in  a  day's  work 
can  make  7  a,  or  3f  b,  or  If  a 

Therefore  one  A  works  for  a,  producing  7a;  two  B's  work 
for  b,  producing  7b;  four  C's  work  for  c,  producing  7  c\ 

A  has  six  a  to  spare,  and  gives  two  a  for  one  b,  and  four  a 
for  one  c.  Each  B  has  2£  b  to  spare,  and  gives  ^  b  for  one  a, 
and  two  b  for  one  c. 

Each  C  has  f  of  c  to  spare,  and  gives  £  c  for  one  b,  and  \  of 
c  for  one  a. 

And  all  have  their  day's  maintenance. 

Generally,  therefore,  it  follows  that  if  the  demand  is  con- 
stant,* the  relative  prices  of  things  are  as  their  costs,  or  as 
the  quantities  of  labour  involved  in  production. 

64  Then,  in  order  to  express  their  prices  in  terms  of  a 
currency,  we  have  only  to  put  the  currency  into  the  form  of 
orders  for  a  certain  quantity  of  any  given  article  (with  us  it 
is  in  the  form  of  orders  for  gold),  and  all  quantities  of  other 
articles  are  priced  by  the  relation  they  bear  to  the  artick 
which  the  currency  claims. 

*  Compare  Unto  this  Last,  p.  115,  et  seq. 


MUNERA  PULVEMS. 


147 


But  the  worth  of  the  currency  itself  is  not  in  the  slightest 
degree  founded  more  on  the  worth  of  the  article  which  it 
either  claims  or  consists  in  (as  gold)  than  on  the  worth  of 
every  other  article  for  which  the  gold  is  exchangeable.  It  is 
just  as  accurate  to  say,  "  so  many  pounds  are  worth  an  acre 
of  land,"  as  "  an  acre  of  land  is  worth  so  many  pounds."  The 
worth  of  gold,  of  land,  of  houses,  and  of  food,  and  of  all 
other  things,  depends  at  any  moment  on  the  existing  quanti- 
ties and  relative  demands  for  all  and  each  ;  and  a  change  in 
the  worth  of,  or  demand  for,  any  one,  involves  an  instantane- 
ously correspondent  change  in  the  worth  of,  and  demand  for, 
all  the  rest ; — a  change  as  inevitable  and  as  accurately  bal- 
anced (though  often  in  its  process  as  untraceable)  as  the 
change  in  volume  of  the  outflowing  river  from  some  vast 
lake,  caused  by  change  in  the  volume  of  the  inflowing 
streams,  though  no  eye  can  trace,  nor  instrument  detect,  mo- 
tion, either  on  its  surface,  or  in  the  depth. 

65.  Thus,  then,  the  real  working  power  or  worth  of  the  cur- 
rency is  founded  on  the  entire  sum  of  the  relative  estimates 
formed  by  the  population  of  its  possessions  ;  a  change  in  this 
estimate  in  any  direction  (and  therefore  every  change  in  the 
national  character),  instantly  alters  the  value  of  money,  in 
its  second  great  function  of  commanding  labour.  But  we 
must  always  carefully  and  sternly  distinguish  between  this 
worth  of  currency,  dependent  on  the  conceived  or  appreciated 
value  of  what  it  represents,  and  the  worth  of  it,  dependent  on 
the  existence  of  what  it  represents.  A  currency  is  true,  or 
false,  in  proportion  to  the  security  with  which  it  gives  claim 
to  the  possession  of  land,  house,  horse,  or  picture  ;  but  a  cur- 
rency is  strong  or  weak*  worth  much,  or  worth  little,  in  pro- 
portion to  the  degree  of  estimate  in  which  the  nation  holds  the 
house,  horse,  or  picture  which  is  claimed.  Thus  the  power 
of  the  English  currency  has  been,  till  of  late,  largely  based  on 
the  national  estimate  of  horses  and  of  wine  :  so  that  a  man 

[*  That  is  to  say,  the  love  of  money  is  founded  first  on  the  intense- 
ness  of  desire  for  given  things  ;  a  youth  will  rob  the  till,  now-a-days, 
for  pantomime  tickets  and  cigars  ;  the  "strength  "  of  the  currency  be- 
ing irresistible  to  him,  in  consequenee  of  his  desire  for  those  luxuries.] 


148 


MUNERA  PULVERIS. 


might  always  give  any  price  to  furnish  choicely  his  stabTe,  01 
his  cellar  ;  and  receive  public  approval  therefor :  but  if  he 
gave  the  same  sum  to  furnish  his  library,  he  was  called  mad 
or  a  biblio-maniac.  And  although  he  might  lose  his  fortune 
by  his  horses,  and  his  health  or  life  by  his  cellar,  and  rarely 
lost  either  by  his  books,  he  was  yet  never  called  a  Hippo* 
maniac  nor  an  Oino-maniac ;  but  only  Biblio-maniac,  because 
the  current  worth  of  money  was  understood  to  be  legiti- 
mately founded  on  cattle  and  wine,  but  not  on  literature.  The 
prices  lately  given  at  sales  for  pictures  and  MSS.  indicate 
some  tendency  to  change  in  the  national  character  in  this  re- 
spect, so  that  the  worth  of  the  currency  may  even  come  in 
time  to  rest,  in  an  acknowledged  manner,  somewhat  on  the 
state  and  keeping  of  the  Bedford  missal,  as  well  as  on  the 
health  of  Caractacus  or  Blink  Bonny ;  and  old  pictures  be 
considered  property,  no  less  than  old  port.  They  might  have 
been  so  before  now,  but  that  it  is  more  difficult  to  choose  the 
one  than  the  other. 

66.  Now,  observe,  all  these  sources  of  variation  in  the  power 
of  the  currency  exist,  wholly  irrespective  of  the  influences  of 
vice,  indolence,  and  improvidence.  We  have  hitherto  sup- 
posed, throughout  the  analysis,  every  professing  labourer 
to  labour  honestly,  heartily,  and  in  harmony  with  his  fellows. 
We  have  now  to  bring  farther  into  the  calculation  the  effects 
of  relative  industry,  honour,  and  forethought ;  and  thus  to 
follow  out  the  bearings  of  our  second  inquiry  :  Who  are  the 
holders  of  the  Store  and  Currency,  and  in  what  proportions  ? 

This,  however,  we  must  reserve  for  our  next  paper— 
noticing  here  only  that,  however  distinct  the  several  branches 
of  the  subject  are,  radically,  they  are  so  interwoven  in  their 
issues  that  we  cannot  rightly  treat  any  one,  till  we  have  taken 
cognizance  of  all.  Thus  the  need  of  the  currency  in  propor. 
tion  to  number  of  population  is  materially  influenced  by  the 
probable  number  of  the  holders  in  proportion  to  the  non- 
holders  ;  and  this  again,  by  the  number  of  holders  of  goods, 
or  wealth,  in  proportion  to  the  non-holders  of  goods.  For  as, 
by  definition,  the  currency  is  a  claim  to  goods  which  are  not 
possessed,  its  quantity  indicates  the  number  of  claimants  in 


MUNERA  PULVERIS. 


149 


proportion  to  the  number  of  holders  ;  and  the  force  and  com- 
plexity of  claim.  For  if  the  claims  be  not  complex,  currency 
as  a  means  of  exchange  may  be  very  small  in  quantity.  A 
sells  some  corn  to  B,  receiving  a  promise  from  B  to  pay  in 
cattle,  which  A  then  hands  over  to  C,  to  get  some  wine.  C 
in  due  time  claims  the  cattle  from  B  ;  and  B  takes  back  his 
promise.  These  exchanges  have,  or  might  have  been,  all 
effected  with  a  single  coin  or  promise  ;  and  the  proportion  of 
the  currency  to  the  store  would  in  such  circumstances  indi- 
cate only  the  circulating  vitality  of  it — that  is  to  say,  the 
quantity  and  convenient  divisibility  of  that  part  of  the  store 
which  the  habits  of  the  nation  keep  in  circulation.  If  a  cattle 
breeder  is  content  to  live  with  his  household  chiefly  on  meat 
and  milk,  and  does  not  want  rich  furniture,  or  jewels,  or  books 
— if  a  wine  and  corn  growler  maintains  himself  and  his  men 
chiefly  on  grapes  and  bread  ; — if  the  wives  and  daughters  of 
families  weave  and  spin  the  clothing  of  the  household,  and 
the  nation,  as  a  whole,  remains  content  with  the  produce  of 
its  own  soil  and  the  work  of  its  own  hands,  it  has  little  occa- 
sion for  circulating  media.  It  pledges  and  promises  little  and 
seldom  ;  exchanges  only  so  far  as  exchange  is  necessary  for 
life.  The  store  belongs  to  the  people  in  whose  hands  it  is 
found,  and  money  is  little  needed  either  as  an  expression  of 
right,  or  practical  means  of  division  and  exckauge. 

67.  But  in  proportion  as  the  habits  of  the  nation  become 
complex  and  fantastic  (and  they  may  be  both,  without  there- 
fore being  civilized),  its  circulating  medium  must  increase  in 
proportion  to  its  store.  If  every  one  wants  a  little  of  every- 
thing,— if  food  must  be  of  many  kinds,  and  dress  of  many 
fashions, — if  mulitudes  live  by  work  which,  ministering  to 
fancy,  has  its  pay  measured  by  fancy,  so  that  large  prices  will 
be  given  by  one  person  for  what  is  valueless  to  another, — if 
there  are  great  inequalities  of  knowledge,  causing  great  in- 
equalities of  estimate, — and,  finally,  and  worst  of  all,  if  the 
currency  itself,  from  its  largeness,  and  the  power  which  the 
possession  of  it  implies,  becomes  the  sole  object  of  desire 
with  large  numbers  of  the  nation,  so  that  the  holding  of  it  ia 
disputed  among  them  as  the  main  object  of  life  : — in  each 


150 


MUNERA  PULVERI8. 


and  all  of  these  cases,  the  currency  necessarily  enlarges  in 
proportion  to  the  store  ;  and  as  a  means  of  exchange  and  di- 
vision, as  a  bond  of  right,  and  as  an  object  of  passion,  has  a 
more  and  more  important  and  malignant  power  over  the  na- 
tion's dealings,  character,  and  life. 

Against  which  power,  when,  as  a  bond  of  Right,  it  becomes 
too  conspicuous  and  too  burdensome,  the  popular  voice  is  apt 
to  be  raised  in  a  violent  and  irrational  manner,  leading  to 
revolution  instead  of  remedy.  Whereas  all  possibility  of 
Economy  depends  on  the-  clear  assertion  and  maintenance 
of  this  bond  of  right,  however  burdensome.  The  first  neces- 
sity of  all  economical  government  is  to  secure  the  unques- 
tioned and  unquestionable  working  of  the  great  law  of  Prop- 
erty—that a  man  who  works  for  a  thing  shall  be  allowed  to  get 
it,  keep  it,  and  consume  it,  in  peace  ;  and  that  he  who  does 
not  eat  his  cake  to-day,  shall  be  seen,  without  grudging,  to 
have  his  cake  to-morrow.  This,  I  say,  is  the  first  point  to  be 
secured  by  social  law  ;  without  this,  no  political  advance,  nay, 
no  political  existence,  is  in  any  sort  possible.  Whatever  evil, 
luxury,  iniquity,  may  seem  to  result  from  it,  this  is  neverthe- 
less the  first  of  all  Equities  ;  and  to  the  enforcement  of  this, 
by  law  and  by  police-truncheon,  the  nation  must  always  pri- 
marily set  its  mind — that  the  cupboard  door  may  have  a  firm 
lock  to  it,  and  no  man's  dinner  be  carried  off  by  the  mob,  oi> 
its  way  home  from  the  baker's.  Which,  thus  fearlessly  assert- 
ing, we  shall  endeavour  in  next  paper  to  consider  how  far  it 
may  be  practicable  for  the  mob  itself,  also,  in  due  breadth  of 
dish,  to  have  dinners  to  carry  home. 


MUNEUA  PULVE1U8. 


151 


CHAPTER  HI 

COIN-KEEPING. 

68.  It  will  be  seen  by  reference  to  the  last  chapter  that  out 
present  task  is  to  examine  the  relation  of  holders  of  store  to 
holders  of  currency  ;  and  of  both  to  those  who  hold  neither. 
In  order  to  do  this,  we  must  determine  on  which  side  we  are 
to  place  substances  such  as  gold,  commonly  known  as  loases 
of  currency.  By  aid  of  previous  definitions  the  reader  will 
now  be  able  to  understand  closer  statements  than  have  yet 
been  possible. 

G9.  The  currency  of  any  country  consists  of  every  document 
acknowledging  debt,  ivhich  is  transferable  in  the  country.* 

This  transferableness  depends  upon  its  intelligibility  and 
credit.  Its  intelligibility  depends  chiefly  on  the  difficulty  of 
forging  anything  like  it  ; — its  credit  much  on  national  char- 
acter, but  ultimately  ahvays  on  the  existence  of  substantial  means 
of  meeting  its  demand.^ 

As  the  degrees  of  transferableness  are  variable,  (some  docu- 
ments passing  only  in  certain  places,  and  others  passing,  if  at 
all,  for  less  than  their  inscribed  value),  both  the  mass,  and,  s6> 
to  speak,  fluidity,  of  the  currency,  are  variable*  True  or  per- 
fect currency  flows  freely,  like  a  pure  stream  ;  it  becomes 
sluggish  or  stagnant  in  proportion  to  the  quantity  of  less 

[*  Remember  tliis  definition :  it  is  of  great  importance  as  opposed  to 
the  imperfect  ones  usually  given.  When  first  these  essays  were  pub- 
lished, I  remember  one  of  their  reviewers  asking  contemptuously,  ' 'Is 
lialf-a-crown  a  document  ?  "  it  never  having  before  occurred  to  him  that 
a  document  might  be  stamped  as  well  as  written,  and  stamped  on  silver 
as  well  as  on  parchment.] 

[f  I  do  not  mean  the  demand  of  the  holder  of  a  five-pound  note  for 
five  pounds,  but  the  demand  of  Mie  holder  of  a  pound  for  a  pound's 
worth  of  something  good.] 


152 


MVNERA  PULVERIS. 


transferable  matter  which  mixes  with  it,  adding  to  its  bulk, 
but  diminishing  its  purity.  [Articles  of  commercial  value,  on 
which  bills  are  drawn,  increase  the  currency  indefinitely  ;  and 
substances  of  intrinsic  value  if  stamped  or  signed  without 
restriction  so  as  to  become  acknowledgments  of  debt,  increase 
it  indefinitely  also.]  Every  bit  of  gold  found  in  Australia,  so 
long  as  it  remains  uncoined,  is  an  article  offered  for  sale  like 
any  other  ;  but  as  soon  as  it  is  coined  into  pounds,  it  dimin- 
ishes  the  value  of  every  pound  we  have  now  in  our  pockets. 

70.  Legally  authorized  or  national  currency,  in  its  perfect 
condition,  is  a  form  of  public  acknowledgment  of  debt,  so  reg- 
ulated and  divided  that  any  person  presenting  a  commodity 
of  tr^ed  worth  in  the  public  market,  shall,  if  he  please,  receive 
in  exchange  for  it  a  document  giving  him  claim  to  the  return 
of  its  equivalent,  (1)  in  any  place,  (2)  at  any  time,  and  (3)  in 
any  kind. 

When  currency  is  quite  healthy  and  vital,  the  persons  en- 
trusted with  its  management  are  always  able  to  give  on  de- 
mand either, 

A.  The  assigning  document  for  the  assigned  quantity  of 
goods.  Or, 

B.  The  assigned  quantity  of  goods  for  the  assigning  docu- 
ment. 

If  they  cannot  give  document  for  goods,  the  national  ex- 
change is  at  fault. 

If  they  cannot  give  goods  for  document,  the  national  credit 
is  at  fault. 

The  nature  and  power  of  the  document  are  therefore  to  be 
examined  under  the  three  relations  it  bears  to  Place,  Time, 
and  Kind. 

71.  (1.)  It  gives  claim  to  the  return  of  equivalent  wealth  in 
any  Place.  Its  use  in  this  function  is  to  save  carriage,  so  that 
parting  with  a  bushel  of  corn  in  London,  we  may  receive  an 
order  for  a  bushel  of  corn  at  the  Antipodes,  or  elsewhere. 
To  be  perfect  in  this  use,  the  substance  of  currency  must  be 
to  the  maximum  portable,  credible,  and  intelligible.  Its  non- 
acceptance  or  discredit  results  always  from  some  form  oi 
ignorance  or  dishonour  :  so  far  as  suck  interruptions  rise  out 


M  UN  ERA  PULVERIS. 


153 


of  differences  in  denomination,  there  is  no  ground  for  their 
continuance  among  civilized  nations.  It  may  be  convenient 
in  one  country  to  use  chiefly  copper  for  coinage,  in  another 
silver,  and  in  another  gold, — reckoning  accordingly  in  cen- 
times, francs,  or  zecchins  :  but  that  a  franc  should  be  dif- 
ferent in  weight  and  value  from  a  shilling,  and  a  zwanziger 
vary  from  both,  is  wanton  loss  of  commercial  power. 

72.  (2.)  It  gives  claim  to  the  return  of  equivalent  wealth  at 
any  Time,  In  this  second  use,  currency  is  the  exponent  of 
accumulation  :  it  renders  the  laying-up  of  store  at  the  com- 
mand of  individuals  unlimitediy  possible  ; — whereas,  but  for 
its  intervention,  all  gathering  would  be  confined  within  cer- 
tain limits  by  the  bulk  of  property,  or  by  its  decay,  or  the 
difficulty  of  its  guardianship.  "  I  will  pull  down  my  barns 
and  build  greater,"  cannot  be  a  daily  saying  ;  and  all  material 
investment  is  enlargement  of  care.  The  national  currency 
transfers  the  guardianship  of  the  store  to  many  ;  and  preserves 
to  the  original  producer  the  right  of  re-entering  on  its  posses- 
sion at  any  future  period. 

73.  (3.)  It  gives  claim  (practical,  though  not  legal)  to  the 
return  of  equivalent  wealth  in  any  Kind.  It  is  a  transferable 
right,  not  merely  to  this  or  that,  but  to  anything ;  and  its 
power  in  this  function  is  proportioned  to  the  range  of  choice. 
If  you  give  a  child  an  apple  or  a  toy,  you  give  him  a  deter- 
minate pleasure,  but  if  you  give  him  a  penny,  an  indeterminate 
one,  proportioned  to  the  range  of  selection  offered  by  the 
shops  in  the  village.  The  power  of  the  world's  currency  is 
similarly  in  proportion  to  the  openness  of  the  world's  fair,  and, 
commonly,  enhanced  by  the  brilliancy  of  external  aspect, 
rather  than  solidity  of  its  wares. 

74.  We  have  said  that  the  currency  consists  of  orders  for 
equivalent  goods.  If  equivalent,  their  quality  must  be  guar- 
anteed. The  kinds  of  goods  chosen  for  specific  claim  must, 
therefore,  be  capable  of  test,  while,  also,  that  a  store  may  be 
kept  in  hand  to  meet  the  call  of  the  currency,  smallness  of 
bulk,  with  great  relative  value,  is  desirable  ;  and  indestructi- 
bility, over  at  least  a  certain  period,  essential. 

Such  indestructibility,  and  facility  of  being  tested,  are 


154 


MUNERA  PULVERI8. 


united  in  gold ;  its  intrinsic  value  is  great,  and  its  imaginary 
value  greater ;  so  that,  partly  through  indolence,  partly 
through  necessity  and  want  of  organization,  most  nations 
have  agreed  to  take  gold  for  the  only  basis  of  their  curren- 
cies . — with  this  grave  disadvantage,  that  its  portability  en- 
abling the  metal  to  become  an  active  part  of  the  medium  of 
exchange,  the  stream  of  the  currency  itself  becomes  opaque 
with  gold — half  currency  and  half  commodity,  in  unison  of 
functions  which  partly  neutralize,  partly  enhance  each  other's 
force. 

75.  They  partly  neutralize,  since  in  so  far  as  the  gold  is 
commodity,  it  is  bad  currency,  because  liable  to  sale  ;  and  in 
so  far  as  it  is  currency,  it  is  bad  commodity,  because  its  ex- 
change value  interferes  with  its  practical  use.  Especially  its 
employment  in  the  higher  branches  of  the  arts  becomes  un- 
safe on  account  of  its  liability  to  be  melted  down  for  exchange. 

Again.  They  partly  enhance,  since  in  so  far  as  the  gold 
has  acknowledged  intrinsic  value,  it  is  good  currency,  be- 
cause everywhere  acceptable  ;  and  in  so  far  as  it  has  legal 
exchangeable  value,  its  worth  as  a  commodity  is  increased. 
We  want  no  gold  in  the  form  of  dust  or  crystal ;  but  we  seek 
for  it  coined,  because  in  that  form  it  will  pay  baker  and 
butcher.  And  this  worth  in  exchange  not  only  absorbs  a 
large  quantity  in  that  use,*  but  greatly  increases  the  effect 

*  [Read  and  think  over,  the  following  note  very  carefully.] 
The  waste  of  labour  in  obtaining  the  gold,  though  it  cannot  be 
estimated  by  help  of  any  existing  data,  may  be  understood  in  its 
bearing  on  entire  economy  by  supposing  it  limited  to  transactions 
between  two  persons.  If  two  farmers  in  Australia  have  been  ex- 
changing corn  and  cattle  with  each  other  for  years,  keeping  their 
accounts  of  reciprocal  debt  in  any  simple  way,  the  sum  of  the  posses- 
sions of  either  would  not  be  diminished,  though  the  part  of  it  which 
was  lent  or  borrowed  were  only  reckoned  by  marks  on  a  stone,  or 
notches  on  a  tree  ;  and  the  one  counted  himself  accordingly,  so  many 
scratches,  or  so  many  notches,  better  than  the  other.  But  it  would 
soon  be  seriously  diminished  if,  discovering  gold  in  their  fields,  each 
resolved  only  to  accept  golden  counters  for  a  reckoning  ;  and  accord- 
ingly, whenever  he  wanted  a  sack  of  corn  or  a  cow,  was  obliged  to  go 
and  wash  sand  for  a  week  before  he  could  get  the  means  of  giving  a 
receipt  for  them. 


MUNERA  PULVERIS. 


155 


on  the  imagination  of  the  quantity  used  in  the  arts.  Thus, 
in  brief,  the  force  of  the  functions  is  increased,  but  their 
precision  blunted,  by  their  unison. 

76.  These  inconveniences,  however,  attach  to  gold  as  a 
basis  of  currency  on  account  of  its  portability  and  precious- 
ness.  But  a  far  greater  inconvenience  attaches  to  it  as  the 
only  legal  basis  of  currency.  Imagine  gold  to  be  only  attain- 
able in  masses  weighing  several  pounds  each,  and  its  value, 
like  that  of  malachite  or  marble,  proportioned  to  its  large- 
ness of  bulk  ; — it  could  not  then  get  itself  confused  with  the 
currency  in  daily  use,  but  it  might  still  remain  as  its  basis  ; 
and  this  second  inconvenience  would  still  affect  it,  namely, 
that  its  significance  as  an  expression  of  debt  varies,  as  that 
of  every  other  article  would,  with  the  popular  estimate  of  its 
desirableness,  and  with  the  quantity  offered  in  the  market. 
My  power  of  obtaining  other  goods  for  gold  depends  always 
on  the  strength  of  public  passion  for  gold,  and  on  the  limita- 
tion of  its  quantity,  so  that  when  either  of  two  things  happen 
— that  the  world  esteems  gold  less,  or  finds  it  more  easily — 
my  right  of  claim  is  in  that  degree  effaced  ;  and  it  has  been 
even  gravely  maintained  that  a  discovery  of  a  mountain  of 
gold  would  cancel  the  National  Debt ;  in  other  words,  that 
men  may  be  paid  for  what  costs  much  in  what  costs  nothing. 
Now,  it  is  true  that  there  is  little  chance  of  sudden  convul- 
sion in  this  respect ;  the  world  will  not  so  rapidly  increase  in 
wisdom  as  to  despise  gold  on  a  sudden  ;  and  perhaps  may 
[for  a  little  time]  desire  it  more  eagerly  the  more  easily  it  is 
obtained  ;  nevertheless,  the  right  of  debt  ought  not  to  rest 
on  a  basis  of  imagination  ;  nor  should  the  frame  of  a  national 
currency  vibrate  with  every  miser's  panic,  and  every  merchant's 
imprudence. 

77.  There  are  two  methods  of  avoiding  this  insecurity, 
which  would  have  been  fallen  upon  long  ago,  if,  instead  of 
calculating  the  conditions  of  the  supply  of  gold,  men  had 
only  considered  how  the  world  might  live  and  manage  its 
affairs  without  gold  at  all.*    One  is,  to  base  the  currency  on 

*  It  ii  difficult  to  estimate  the  curious  futility  of  discussions  such  as 
that  which  lately  occupied  a  section  of  the  British  Association,  on  tli*» 


|56 


M  UN  ERA  PULVERIS. 


substances  of  truer  intrinsic  value  ;  the  other,  to  base  it  on 
several  substances  instead  of  one.  If  I  can  only  claim  gold, 
the  discovery  of  a  golden  mountain  starves  me  ;  but  if  I  can 
claim  bread,  the  discovery  of  a  continent  of  corn-fields  need 
not  trouble  me.  If,  however,  I  wish  to  exchange  my  bread 
for  other  things,  a  good  harvest  will  for  the  time  limit  my 
power  in  this  respect ;  but  if  I  can  claim  either  bread,  iron, 
or  silk  at  pleasure,  the  standard  of  value  has  three  feet  instead 
of  one,  and  will  be  proportionately  firm.  Thus,  ultimately, 
the  steadiness  of  currency  depends  upon  the  breadth  of  its 
base  ;  but  the  difficulty  of  organization  increasing  with  this 
breadth,  the  discovery  of  the  condition  at  once  safest  and 
most  convenient*  can  only  be  by  long  analysis,  which  must 
for  the  present  be  deferred.  Gold  or  silver  f  may  always  be 
retained  in  limited  use,  as  a  luxury  of  coinage  and  question- 
less standard,  of  one  weight  and  alloy  among  all  nations,  vary- 
ing only  in  the  die.  The  purity  of  coinage,  when  metallic,  is 
closely  indicative  of  the  honesty  of  the  system  of  revenue,  and 
even  of  the  general  dignity  of  the  State. J 

absorption  of  gold,  while  no  one  can  produce  even  the  simplest  of  the 
data  necessary  for  the  inquiry.  To  take  the  first  occurring  one, — What 
means  have  we  of  ascertaining  the  weight  of  gold  employed  this  year  in 
the  toilettes  of  the  women  of  Europe  (not  to  speak  of  Asia) ;  and,  sup- 
posing it  known,  what  means  of  conjecturing  the  weight  by  which,  next 
year,  their  fancies,  and  the  changes  of  style  among  their  jewellers,  will 
diminish  or  increase  it  ? 

*  See,  in  Pope's  epistle  to  Lord  Bathurst,  his  sketch  of  the  difficul- 
ties and  uses  of  a  currency  literally  11  pecuniary  " — (consisting  of  herdg 
of  cattle). 

"  His  Grace  will  game — to  White's  a  bull  be  led,"  &c. 

f  Perhaps  both  ;  perhaps  silver  only.  It  may  be  found  expedient 
ultimately  to  leave  gold  free  for  use  in  the  arts.  As  a  means  of  reck- 
oning, the  standard  might  be,  and  in  some  cases  has  already  been, 
entirely  ideal. — See  Mill's  Political  Economy,  book  iii.  chap.  vn.  at 
beginning. 

%  The  purity  of  the  drachma  and  zecchin  were  not  without  signifi- 
cance of  the  state  of  intellect,  art,  and  policy,  both  in  Athens  and  Ven- 
ice ;— a  fact  first  impressed  upon  me  ten  years  ago,  when,  in  taking 
daguerreotypes  at  Venice,  I  found  no  purchaseable  gold  pure  enough  U 
gild  them  with,  except  that  of  the  old  Venetian  zecchin. 


MUNERA  PULVERIS. 


157 


78.  Whatever  the  article  or  articles  may  be  which  the  national 
currency  promises  to  pay,  a  premium  on  that  article  indicates 
bankruptcy  of  the  government  in  that  proportion,  the  division 
of  its  assets  being  restrained  only  by  the  remaining  confidence 
of  the  holders  of  notes  in  the  return  of  prosperity  to  the  firm. 
Currencies  of  forced  acceptance,  or  of  unlimited  issue,  are 
merely  various  modes  of  disguising  taxation,  and  delaying 
its  pressure,  until  it  is  too  late  to  interfere  with  the  cause  of 
pressure.  To  do  away  with  the  possibility  of  such  disguise 
would  have  been  among  the  first  results  of  a  true  economical 
science,  had  any  such  existed  ;  but  there  have  been  too  many 
motives  for  the  concealment,  so  long  as  it  could  by  any  arti- 
fices be  maintained,  to  permit  hitherto  even  the  founding  of 
such  a  science.  % 

79.  And  indeed,  it  is  only  through  evil  conduct,  wilfully 
persisted  in,  that  there  is  any  embarrassment,  either  in  the 
theory  or  working  of  currency.  No  exchequer  is  ever  em- 
barrassed, nor  is  any  financial  question  difficult  of  solution, 
when  people  keep  their  practice  honest,  and  their  heads  cool. 
But  when  governments  lose  all  office  of  pilotage,  protection, 
or  scrutiny ;  and  live  only  in  magnificence  of  authorized  lar- 
ceny, and  polished  mendicity ;  or  when  the  people,  choosing 
Speculation  (the  8  usually  redundant  in  the  spelling)  instead 
of  Toil,  visit  no  dishonesty  with  chastisement,  that  each  may 
with  impunity  take  his  dishonest  turn  ; — there  are  no  tricks 
of  financial  terminology  that  will  save  them ;  all  signature 
and  mintage  do  but  magnify  the  ruin  they  retard  ;  and  even 
the  riches  that  remain,  stagnant  or  current,  change  only  from 
the  slime  of  Avernus  to  the  sand  of  Phlegethon — ^uc&sand 
at  the  embouchure  ; — land  fluently  recommended  by  recent 
auctioneers  as  "  eligible  for  building  leases." 

80.  Finally,  then,  the  power  of  true  currency  is  fourfold. 
(1.)  Credit  power.    Its  worth  in  exchange,  dependent  on 

public  opinion  of  the  stability  and  honesty  of  the  issuer. 

(2.)  Real  worth.  Supposing  the  gold,  or  whatever  else  the 
currency  expressly  promises,  to  be  required  from  the  issuer, 
for  all  his  notes  ;  and  that  the  call  cannot  be  met  in  full. 
Then  the  actual  worth  of  the  document  would  be,  and  its  act-- 


153 


MUNERA  PULVER1S. 


ual  worth  at  any  moment  is,  therefore  to  be  defined  as,  what 
the  division  of  the  assets  of  the  issuer  would  produce  for  it. 

(3.)  The  exchange  power  of  its  base.  Granting  that  we 
can  get  five  pounds  in  gold  for  our  note,  it  remains  a  ques- 
tion how  much  of  other  things  we  can  get  for  five  pounds  in 
gold.  The  more  of  other  things  exist,  and  the  less  gold,  the 
greater  this  power. 

(4.)  The  power  over  labour,  exercised  by  the  given  quantity 
of  the  base,  or  of  the  things  to  be  got  for  it.  The  question 
in  this  case  is,  how  much  work,  and  (question  of  questions  !) 
tohose  work,  is  to  be  had  for  the  food  which  five  pounds  will 
buy.  This  depends  on  the  number  of  the  population,  on  their 
gifts,  and  on  their  dispositions,  with  which,  down  to  their 
slightest  humours,  and  up  to  their  strongest  impulses,  the 
power  of  the  currency  varies. 

81.  Such  being  the  main  conditions  of  national  currency, 
we  proceed  to  examine  those  of  the  total  currency,  under  the 
broad  definition,  " transferable  acknowledgment  of  debt;"* 

*  Under  which  term,  observe,  we  include  all  documents  of  debt, 
which,  being  honest,  might  be  transferable,  though  they  practically  are 
not  transferred  ;  while  we  exclude  all  documents  which  are  in  reality 
worthless,  though  in  fact  transferred  temporarily,  as  bad  money  is. 
The  document  of  honest  debt,  not  transferred,  is  merely  to  paper  cur- 
rency  as  gold  withdrawn  from  circulation  is  to  that  of  bullion.  Much 
confusion  has  crept  into  the  reasoning  on  this  subject  from  the  idea  that 
the  withdrawal  from  circulation  is  a  definable  state,  whereas  it  is  a 
graduated  state,  and  indefinable.  The  sovereign  in  my  pocket  is  with- 
drawn from  circulation  as  long  as  I  choose  to  keep  it  there.  It  is  no 
otherwise  withdrawn  if  I  bury  it,  nor  even  if  I  choose  to  make  it,  and 
others,  into  a  golden  cup,  and  drink  out  of  them  ;  since  a  rise  in  the 
price  of  the  wine,  or  of  other  things,  may  at  any  time  cause  me  to  melt 
the  cup  and  throw  it  back  into  currency  ;  and  the  bullion  operates  on 
the  prices  of  the  things  in  the  market  as  directly,  though  not  as  forcibly, 
while  it  is  in  the  form  of  a  cup  as  it  does  in  the  form  of  a  sovereign. 
No  calculation  can  be  founded  on  my  humour  in  either  case.  If  I  like 
to  handle  rouleaus,  and  therefore  keep  a  quantity  of  gold,  to  play  with, 
in  the  form  of  jointed  basaltic  columns,  it  is  all  one  in  its  effect  on  the 
market  as  if  I  kept  it  in  the  form  of  twisted  filigree,  or,  steadily  "  ami- 
cus lamnaV'  beat  the  narrow  gold  pieces  into  broad  ones,  and  dined  off 
them.  The  probability  is  greater  that  I  break  the  rouleau  than  that  I 
melt  the  pHte  ;  but  the  increased  probability  is  not  calculable.  Thus, 


MUNERA  PULVERI8. 


159 


among  the  many  forms  of  which  there  are  in  eltect  only  two, 
distinctly  opposed  ;  namely,  the  acknowledgments  of  debts 
which  will  be  paid,  and  of  debts  which  will  not.  Documents, 
whether  in  whole  or  part,  of  bad  debt,  being  to  those  of 
good  debt  as  bad  money  to  bullion,  we  put  for  the  present 
these  forms  of  imposture  aside  (as  in  analysing  a  metal  we 
should  wash  it  clear  of  dross),  and  then  range,  in  their  exact 
quantities,  the  true  currency  of  the  country  on  one  side,  and 
the  store  or  property  of  the  country  on  the  other.  "We  place 
gold,  and  all  such  substances,  on  the  side  of  documents,  as 
far  as  they  operate  by  signature  ; — on  the  side  of  store  as  far 
as  they  operate  by  value.  Then  the  currency  represents  the 
quantity  of  debt  in  the  country,  and  the  store  the  quantity 
of  its  possession.  The  ownership  of  all  the  property  is  divided 
between  the  holders  of  currency  and  holders  of  store,  and 
whatever  the  claiming  value  of  the  currency  is  at  any  moment, 
that  value  is  to  be  deducted  from  the  riches  of  the  store- 
holders. 

82.  Farther,  as  true  currency  represents  by  definition  debts 
which  will  be  paid,  it  represents  either  the  debtor's  wealth, 
or  his  ability  and  willingness  ;  that  is  to  say,  either  wealth  ex- 
isting in  his  hands  transferred  to  him  by  the  creditor,  or 
wealth  which,  as  he  is  at  some  time  surely  to  return  it,  he  is 
either  increasing,  or,  if  diminishing,  has  the  will  and  strength 
to  reproduce.  A  sound  currency  therefore,  as  by  its  increase 
it  represents  enlarging  debt,  represents  also  enlarging  means  ; 
but  in  this  curious  way,  that  a  certain  quantity  of  it  marks 
the  deficiency  of  the  wealth  of  the  country  from  what  it  would 
have  been  if  that  currency  had  not  existed.*    In  this  respect 

documents  are  only  withdrawn  from  the  currency  when  cancelled,  and 
bullion  when  it  is  so  effectually  lost  as  that  the  probability  of  finding  it 
is  no  greater  than  of  finding  new  gold  in  the  mine. 

*  For  example,  suppose  an  active  peasant,  having  got  his  ground  into 
good  order  and  built  himself  a  comfortable  house,  finding  time  still  on 
his  hands,  sees  one  of  his  neighbours  little  able  to  work,  and  ill-lodged, 
and  offers  to  build  him  also"  a  house,  and  to  put  his  land  in  order,  on 
condition  of  receiving  for  a  given  period  rent  for  the  building  and  tithe 
of  the  fruits.  The  offer  is  accepted,  and  a  document  given  promissory 
of  rent  and  tithe.    This  note  is  money.    It  can  only  be  good  money  if 


160 


MUNERA  PULVERIS. 


it  is  like  the  detritus  of  a  mountain  ;  assume  that  it  lies  at  a 
fixed  angle,  and  the  more  the  detritus,  the  larger  must  be  the 
mountain  ;  but  it  would  have  been  larger  still,  had  there  been 
none. 

83.  Farther,  though,  as  above  stated,  every  man  possessing 
money  has  usually  also  some  property  beyond  what  is  neces- 
sary for  his  immediate  wants,  and  men  possessing  property 
usually  also  hold  currency  beyond  what  is  necessary  for  their 
immediate  exchanges,  it  mainly  determines  the  class  to  which 
they  belong,  whether  in  their  eyes  the  money  is  an  adjunct  of 
the  property,  or  the  property  of  the  money.  In  the  first  case 
the  holder's  pleasure  is  in  his  possessions,  and  in  his  money 
subordinately,  as  the  means  of  bettering  or  adding  to  them. 
In  the  second,  his  pleasure  is  in  his  money,  and  in  his  posses- 
sions only  as  representing  it.  (In  the  first  case  the  money  is 
as  an  atmosphere  surrounding  the  wealth,  rising  from  it  and 
raining  back  upon  it ;  but  in  the  second,  it  is  as  a  deluge, 
with  the  wealth  floating,  and  for  the  most  part  perishing  in 
it.*)  The  shortest  distinction  between  the  men  is  that  the  one 
wishes  always  to  buy,  and  the  other  to  sell. 

84.  Such  being  the  great  relations  of  the  classes,  their  sev- 
eral characters  are  of  the  highest  importance  to  the  nation  ; 
for  on  the  character  of  the  store-holders  chiefly  depend  the 
preservation,  display,  and  serviceableness  of  its  wealth  ;  on 
that  of  the  currency-holders,  its  distribution  ;  on  that  of  both, 
its  reproduction. 

We  shall,  therefore,  ultimately  find  it  to  be  of  incomparably 
greater  importance  to  the  nation  in  whose  hands  the  thing  is 

the  man  who  has  incurred  the  debt  so  far  recovers  his  strength  as  to  be 
able  to  take  advantage  of  the  help  he  has  received,  and  meet  the  de- 
mand of  the  note  ;  if  he  lets  his  house  fall  to  ruin,  and  his  field  to 
waste,  his  promissory  note  will  soon  be  valueless:  but  the  existence  of 
the  note  at  all  is  a  consequence  of  his  not  having  worked  so  stoutly  as 
the  other.  Let  him  gain  as  much  as  to  be  able  to  pay  back  the  entire 
debt  ;  the  note  is  cancelled,  and  we  have  two  rich  store-holders  and  no 
currency. 

[*  You  need  not  trouble  yourself  to  make  out  the  sentence  in  paren- 
thesis, unless  you  like,  but  do  not  think  it  is  mere  metaphor.  It  states' 
&  fact  which  I  could  not  have  stated  so  shortly,  but  by  metaphor.] 


M  UN  ERA  PULVERIS. 


1G1 


put,  than  how  much  of  it  is  got ;  and  that  the  character  of  the 
holders  may  be  conjectured  by  the  quality  of  the  store  ;  for 
such  and  such  a  man  always  asks  for  such  and  such  a  thing ; 
nor  only  asks  for  it,  but  if  it  can  be  bettered,  betters  it :  so 
that  possession  and  possessor  reciprocally  act  on  each  other, 
through  the  entire  sum  of  national  possession.  The  base  na- 
tion, asking  for  base  things,  sinks  daily  to  deeper  vileness  of 
nature  and  weakness  in  use  ;  while  the  noble  nation,  asking 
for  noble  things,  rises  daily  into  diviner  eminence  in  both  ; 
the  tendency  to  degradation  being  surely  marked  by  "  drafta  ; " 
that  is  to  say,  (expanding  the  Greek  thought),  by  carelessness 
as  to  the  hands  in  which  things  are  put,  consequent  dispute 
for  the  acquisition  of  them,  disorderliness  in  the  accumulation 
of  them,  inaccuracy  in  the  estimate  of  them,  and  bluntness  in 
conception  as  to  the  entire  nature  of  possession. 

85.  The  currreney-holders  always  increase  in  number  and 
influence  in  proportion  to  the  bluntness  of  nature  and  clumsi- 
ness of  the  store-holders  ;  for  the  less  use  people  can  make  of 
things,  the  more  they  want  of  them,  and  the  sooner  weary  of 
them,  and  want  to  change  them  for  something  else  ;  and  all 
frequency  of  change  increases  the  quantity  and  power  of  cur- 
rency. The  large  currency-holder  himself  is  essentially  a  per- 
son who  never  has  been  able  to  make  up  his  mind  as  to  what 
he  will  have,  and  proceeds,  therefore,  in  vague  collection  and 
aggregation,  with  more  and  more  infuriate  passion,  urged  by 
complacency  in  progress,  vacancy  in  idea,  and  pride  of  con- 
quest. 

While,  however,  there  is  this  obscurity  in  the  nature  of 
possession  of  currency,  there  is  a  charm  in  the  seclusion  of  it, 
which  is  to  some  people  very  enticing.  In  the  enjoyment  of 
real  property,  others  must  partly  share.  The  groom  has 
some  enjoyment  of  the  stud,  and  the  gardener  of  the  garden  ; 
but  the  money  is,  or  seems,  shut  up  ;  it  is  wholly  enviable. 
No  one  else  can  have  part  in  any  complacencies  arising  from 
it. 

The  power  of  arithmetical  comparison  is  also  a  great  thing 
to  unimagiDative  people.  They  know  always  they  are  so  much 
better  than  they  were,  in  money ;  so  much  better  than  others* 


162 


M  UN  ERA  PULVER18. 


in  money  ;  but  wit  cannot  be  so  compared,  nor  character, 
My  neighbour  cannot  be  convinced  that  I  am  wiser  than  he 
is,  but  he  can,  that  I  am  worth  so  much  more  ;  and  the  uni- 
versality of  the  conviction  is  no  less  flattering  than  its  clear- 
ness. Only  a  few  can  understand, — none  measure — and  few 
will  willingly  adore,  superiorities  in  other  things  ;  but  every- 
body can  understand  money,  everybody  can  count  it,  and 
most  will  wrorship  it. 

86.  Now,  these  various  temptations  to  accumulation  wTould 
be  politically  harmless  if  w7hat  was  vainly  accumulated  had  any 
fair  chance  of  being  wisely  spent.  For  as  accumulation  can- 
not go  on  for  ever,  but  must  some  day  end  in  its  reverse — if 
this  reverse  were  indeed  a  beneficial  distribution  and  use,  as 
irrigation  from  reservoir,  the  fever  of  gathering,  though  peril- 
ous to  the  gatherer,  might  be  serviceable  to  the  community. 
But  it  constantly  happens  (so  constantly,  that  it  may  be  stated 
as  a  political  law  having  few  exceptions),  that  what  is  unreas- 
onably gathered  is  also  unreasonably  spent  by  the  persons  into 
whose  hands  it  finally  falls.  Very  frequently  it  is  spent  in 
war,  or  else  in  a  stupefying  luxury,  twice  hurtful,  both  in  be- 
ing indulged  by  the  rich  and  witnessed  by  the  poor.  So  that 
the  mat  tener  and  mal  dare  are  as  correlative  as  complementary 
colours ;  and  the  circulation  of  wealth,  which  ought  to  be 
soft,  steady,  strong,  far-sweeping,  and  full  of  wrarmth,  like  the 
Gulf  stream,  being  narrowed  into  an  eddy,  and  concentrated 
on  a  point,  changes  into  the  alternate  suction  and  surrender 
of  Charybdis.  "Which  is  indeed,  I  doubt  not,  the  true  mean- 
ing of  that  marvellous  fable,  "  infinite,"  as  Bacon  said  of  it, 
"in  matter  of  meditation."  * 

87.  It  is  a  strange  habit  of  wise  humanity  to  speak  in  enig- 
mas only,  so  that  the  highest  truths  and  usefullest  laws  must 
be  hunted  for  through  whole  picture-galleries  of  dreams, 
which  to  the  vulgar  seem  dreams  only.  Thus  Homer,  the 
Greek  tragedians,  Plato,  Dante,  Chaucer,  Shakspeare,  and 
Goethe,  have  hidden  all  that  is  chiefly  serviceable  in  their 

[*  What  follows,  to  the  end  of  the  chapter,  was  a  note  only,  in  the 
first  printing  ;  but  for  after  service,  it  is  of  more  value  than  any  othej 
part  of  the  book,  so  I  have  put  it  into  the  main  text.  ] 


MUNERA  PUL  VERTS. 


163 


work,  and  in  all  the  various  literature  they  absorbed  and  re* 
embodied,  under  types  which  have  rendered  it  quite  useless  to 
the  multitude.  What  is  worse,  the  two  primal  declarers  of 
moral  discovery,  Homer  and  Plato,  are  partly  at  issue  ;  for 
Plato's  logical  power  quenched  his  imagination,  and  he  be* 
came  incapable  of  understanding  the  purely  imaginative  ele- 
ment either  in  poetry  or  painting  :  he  therefore  somewhat 
overrates  the  pure  discipline  of  passionate  art  in  song  and 
music,  and  misses  that  of  meditative  art.  There  is,  however, 
a  deeper  reason  for  his  distrust  of  Homer.  His  love  of  justice, 
and  reverently  religious  nature,  made  him  dread,  as  death, 
every  form  of  fallacy  ;  but  chiefly,  fallacy  respecting  the 
world  to  come  (his  own  myths  being  only  symbolic  exponents 
of  a  rational  hope).  We  shall  perhaps  now  every  day  dis- 
cover more  clearly  how  right  Plato  was  in  this,  and  feel  our- 
selves more  and  more  wonderstruck  that  men  such  as  Homer 
and  Dante  (and,  in  an  inferior  sphere,  Milton),  not  to  speak 
of  the  great  sculptors  and  painters  of  every  age,  have  permit- 
ted themselves,  though  full  of  all  nobleness  and  wisdom,  to 
coin  idle  imaginations  of  the  mysteries  of  eternity,  and  guide 
the  faiths  of  the  families  of  the  earth  by  the  courses  of  their 
own  vague  and  visionary  arts  :  while  the  indisputable  truths 
of  human  life  and  duty,  respecting  which  they  all  have  but 
one  voice,  lie  hidden  behind  these  veils  of  phantasy,  unsought, 
and  often  unsuspected.  I  will  gather  carefully,  out  of  Dante 
and  Homer,  what,  in  this  kind,  bears  on  our  subject,  in  its 
due  place  ;  the  first  broad  intention  of  their  symbols  may  be 
sketched  at  once. 

88.  The  rewards  of  a  worthy  use  of  riches,  subordinate  to 
other  ends,  are  shown  by  Dante  in  the  fifth  and  sixth  orbs  of 
Paradise  ;  for  the  punishment  of  their  unworthy  use,  three 
places  are  assigned  ;  one  for  the  avaricious  and  prodigal 
whose  souls  are  lost,  {Hell,  canto  7)  ;  one  for  the  avaricious 
and  prodigal  whose  souls  are  capable  of  purification,  {Purga- 
tory, canto  19)  ;  and  one  for  the  usurers,  of  whom  none  can 
be  redeemed  (Hell,  canto  17).  The  first  group,  the  largest  in 
all  hell("gente  piu  che  altrove  troppa,"  compare  Virgil's 
"  quae  maxima  turba "),  meet  in  contrary  currents,  as  the 


MUNERA  PULYERI8. 


imves  of  Charybdis,  casting  weights  at  each  other  from  oppo- 
site sides.  This  weariness  of  contention  is  the  chief  element 
of  their  torture  ;  so  marked  by  the  beautiful  lines  beginning 
"  Or  puoi,  figliuol,"  &c. :  (but  the  usurers,  who  made  their 
money  inactively,  mi  on  the  sand,  equally  without  rest,  how- 
ever. "  Di  qua,  di  la,  soccorrien,  &c.)  For  it  is  not  avarice, 
but  contention  for  riches,  leading  to  this  double  misuse  of 
them,  which,  in  Dante's  light,  is  the  unredeemable  sin.  The 
place  of  its  punishment  is  guarded  by  Plutus,  "the  great 
enemy,"  and  "  la  fiera  crudele,"  a  spirit  quite  different  from 
the  Greek  Plutus,  who,  though  old  and  blind,  is  not  cruel, 
and  is  curable,  so  as  to  become  far-sighted,  (ov  rvcf)\b$  dX/V 
o^v  pXewiDv, — Plato's  epithets  in  first  book  of  the  Laws.)  Still 
more  does  this  Dantesque  type  differ  from  the  resplendent 
Plutus  of  Goethe  in  the  second  part  of  Faust,  who  is  the  per- 
sonified power  of  wealth  for  good  or  evil — not  the  passion  for 
Avealth  ;  and  again  from  the  Plutus  of  Spenser,  who  is  the 
passion  of  mere  aggregation.  Dante's  Plutus  is  specially  and 
definitely  the  Spirit  of  Contention  and  Competition,  or  Evil 
Commerce  ;  because,  as  I  showed  before,  this  kind  of  com- 
merce "  makes  all  men  strangers  ; "  his  speech  is  therefore 
unintelligible,  and  no  single  soul  of  all  those  ruined  by  him 
has  recognizable  feat  u  res. 

On  the  other  hand,  the  redeemable  sins  of  avarice  and 
prodigality  are,  in  Dante's  sight,  those  which  are  without  de- 
liberate or  calculated  operation.  The  lust,  or  lavishness,  of 
riches  can  be  purged,  so  long  as  there  has  been  no  servile 
consistency  of  dispute  and  competition  for  them.  The  sin  is 
spoken  of  as  that  of  degradation  by  the  love  of  earth  ;  it  is 
purified  by  deeper  humiliation — the  souls  crawl  on  their  bel- 
lies ;  their  chant  is,  "my  soul  cieaveth  unto  the  dust."  But 
the  spirits  thus  condemned  are  all  recognizable,  and  even  the 
wTorst  examples  of  the  thirst  for  gold,  which  they  are  com- 
pelled to  tell  the  histories  of  during  the  night,  are  of  men 
swept  by  the  passion  of  avarice  into  violent  crime,  but  not 
sold  to  its  steady  work. 

89.  The  precept  given  to  each  of  these  spirits  for  its  de- 
liverance is — Turn  thine  eyes  to  the  lucre  (lure)  which  the 


MUNERA  PULVERIS. 


165 


Eternal  King  rolls  with  the  mighty  wheels.  Otherwise,  the 
wheels  of  the  "Greater  Fortune,"  of  which  the  constellation 
is  ascending  when  Dante's  dream  begins.  Compare  George 
Herbert — 

"  Lift  up  thy  head  ; 
Take  stars  for  money  ;  stars,  not  to  be  told 
By  any  art,  yet  to  be  purchased." 

And  Plato's  notable  sentence  in  the  third  book  of  the  Polity . 

Tell  them  they  have  divine  gold  and  silver  in  their  souls 
for  ever  ;  that  they  need  no  money  stamped  of  men — neither 
may  they  otherwise  than  impiously  mingle  the  gathering  of 
the  divine  with  the  mortal  treasure,  for  through  that  which  the 
law  of  the  multitude  has  coined,  endless  crimes  have  been  done 
and  suffered  ;  but  in  their's  is  neither  pollution  nor  sorrow" 

90.  At  the  entrance  of  this  place  of  punishment  an  evil 
spirit  is  seen  by  Dante,  quite  other  than  the  "  Gran  Nemico." 
The  great  enemy  is  obeyed  knowingly  and  willingly  ;  but  this 
spirit — feminine — and  called  a  Siren — is  the  "  Deceitfulness  of 
riches,"  airdryj  ttXovtov  of  the  Gospels,  winning  obedience  by 
guile.  This  is  the  Idol  of  riches,  made  doubly  phantasmal  by 
Dante's  seeing  her  in  a  dream.  She  is  lovely  to  look  upon, 
and  enchants  by  her  sweet  singing,  but  her  womb  is  loath- 
some. Now,  Dante  does  not  call  her  one  of  the  Sirens  care- 
lessly, any  more  than  he  speaks  of  Charybdis  carelessly  ; 
and  though  he  had  got  at  the  meaning  of  the  Homeric  fable 
only  through  Virgil's  obscure  tradition  of  it,  the  clue  he  has 
given  us  is  quite  enough.  Bacon's  interpretation,  "  the  Sirens, 
or  pleasures"  which  has  become  universal  since  his  time,  is 
opposed  alike  to  Plato's  meaning  and  Homer's.  The  Sirens 
are  not  pleasures,  but  Desires :  in  the  Odyssey  they  are  the 
phantoms  of  vain  desire ;  but  in  Plato's  Vision  of  Destiny,  phan- 
toms of  divine  desire  ;  singing  each  a  different  note  on  the 
circles  of  the  distaff  of  Necessity,  but  forming  one  harmony, 
to  which  the  three  great  Fates  put  words.  Dante,  however, 
adopted  the  Homeric  conception  of  them,  which  was  that 
they  were  demons  of  the  Imagination,  not  carnal ;  (desire  of 
the  eyes  5  not  lust  of  the  flesh)  ;  therefore  said  to  be  daughters 
of  the  Muses.    Yet  not  of  the  Muses,  heavenly  or  historical 


16G 


HUN  ERA  PUL  VERTS. 


but  of  the  Muse  of  pleasure ;  and  they  are  at  first  winged, 
because  even  vain  hope  excites  and  helps  when  first  formed  ; 
but  afterwards,  contending  for  the  possession  of  the  imagi- 
nation with  the  Muses  themselves,  they  are  deprived  of  their 
wings. 

91.  And  thus  we  are  to  distinguish  the  Siren  power  from 
the  power  of  Circe,  who  is  no  daughter  of  the  Muses,  but  of 
the  strong  elements,  Sun  and  Sea  ;  her  power  is  that  of  frank, 
and  full  vital  pleasure,  which,  if  governed  and  watched, 
nourishes  men  ;  but,  un watched,  and  having  no  "  moly,"  bit* 
terness  or  delay,  mixed  with  it,  turns  men  into  beasts,  but 
does  not  slay  them, — leaves  them,  on  the  contrary,  power  of 
revival.  She  is  herself  indeed  an  Enchantress  ; — pure  Animal 
life  ;  transforming — or  degrading — but  always  wonderful  (she 
puts  the  stores  on  board  the  ship  invisibly,  and  is  gone  again, 
like  a  ghost)  ;  even  the  wild  beasts  rejoice  and  are  softened 
around  her  cave  ;  the  transforming  poisons  she  gives  to  men 
are  mixed  with  no  rich  feast,  but  with  pure  and  right  nour- 
ishment,— Pramnian  wine,  cheese,  and  flour ;  that  is,  wine, 
milk,  and  corn,  the  three  great  sustainers  of  life — it  is  their 
own  fault  if  these  make  swine  of  them ;  (see  Appendix  V.) 
and  swine  are  chosen  merely  as  the  type  of  consumption  ;  as 
Plato's  vmv  ttoAis,  in  the  second  book  of  the  Polity,  and  per- 
haps chosen  by  Homer  with  a  deeper  knowledge  of  the  like- 
ness in  variety  of  nourishment,  and  internal  form  of  body. 

"Et  quel  est,  s'il  vous  plait,  cet  audacieux  animal  qui  se 
permet  d'etre  bati  au  dedans  comme  une  jolie  petite  fille  ?" 

"  Helas  !  chere  enfant,  j'ai  honte  de  le  nommer,  et  il  ne 
faudra  pas  m'en  vouloir.  C'est  .  .  .  c'est  le  cochon.  Ce 
n'est  pas  precisement  flatteur  pour  vous ;  mais  nous  en 
sommes  tous  la,  et  si  cela  vous  contrarie  par  trop,  il  faut  aller 
vous  plaindre  au  bon  Dieu  qui  a  voulu  que  les  choses  fussent 
arrangees  ainsi :  seulement  le  cochon,  qui  ne  pense  qu'a  man- 
ger, a  l'estomac  bien  plus  vaste  que  nous  et  c'est  toujours  une 
consolation." — (Histoire  3?  une  Bouch.ee  de  Pain,  Lettre  ix.) 

92.  But  the  deadly  Sirens  are  in  all  things  opposed  to  the 
Circean  power.  They  promise  pleasure,  but  never  give  it. 
They  nourish  in  no  wise  ;  but  slay  by  slow  death.  And 


MTINEUA  PULVER1S. 


167 


whereas  they  corrupt  the  heart  and  the  head,  instead  of 
merely  betraying  the  senses,  there  is  no  recovery  from  their 
power  ;  they  do  not  tear  nor  scratch,  like  Scylla,  but  the  men 
who  have  listened  to  them  are  poisoned,  and  waste  away. 
Note  that  the  Sirens'  field  is  covered,  not  merely  with  the 
bones,  but  with  the  skins,  of  those  who  have  been  consumed 
there.  They  address  themselves,  in  the  part  of  the  song 
which  Homer  gives,  not  to  the  passions  of  Ulysses,  but  to  his 
vanity,  and  the  only  man  who  ever  came  within  hearing  of 
them,  and  escaped  untempted,  was  Orpheus,  who  silenced  the 
vain  imaginations  by  singing  the  praises  of  the  gods. 

93.  It  is,  then,  one  of  these  Sirens  whom  Dante  takes  as 
the  phantasm  or  deceitfulness  of  riches  ;  but  note  further, 
that  she  says  it  was  her  song  that  deceived  Ulysses.  Look 
back  to  Dante's  account  of  Ulysses'  death,  and  we  find  it  was 
not  the  love  of  money,  but  pride  of  knowledge,  that  betrayed 
him  ;  whence  we  get  the  clue  to  Dante's  complete  meaning : 
that  the  souls  whose  love  of  wealth  is  pardonable  have  been 
first  deceived  into  pursuit  of  it  by  a  dream  of  its  higher  uses, 
or  by  ambition.  His  Siren  is  therefore  the  Philotime  of 
Spenser,  daughter  of  Mammon — 

"  Wliem  all  that  folk  with,  such  contention 
Do  flock  about,  my  deare,  my  daughter  is — 
Honour  and  dignitie  from  her  alone 
Derived  are." 

By  comparing  Spenser's  entire  account  of  this  Philotime 
with  Dante's  of  the  Wealth-Siren,  we  shall  get  at  the  full 
meaning  of  both  poets  ;  but  that  of  Homer  lies  hidden  much 
more  deeply.  For  his  Sirens  are  indefinite  ;  and  they  are  de- 
sires of  any  evil  thing  ;  power  of  wealth  is  not  specially  indi- 
cated by  him,  until,  escaping  the  harmonious  danger  of  im- 
agination, Ulysses  has  to  choose  between  two  practical  ways 
of  life,  indicated  by  the  two  rocks  of  Scylla  and  Charybdis. 
The  monsters  that  haunt  them  are  quite  distinct  from  the 
rocks  themselves,  which,  having  many  other  subordinate  sig- 
nifications, are  in  the  main  Labour  and  Idleness,  or  getting 
and  spending ;  each  with  its  attendant  monster,  or  betraying 


168 


MUNERA  PULVERIS. 


demon.  The  rock  of  gaining  has  its  summit  in  the  clouds,  in* 
visible,  and  not  to  be  climbed  ;  that  of  spending  is  low,  but 
marked  by  the  cursed  fig-tree,  which  has  leaves,  but  no  fruit. 
We  know  the  type  elsewhere ;  and  there  is  a  curious  lateral 
allusion  to  it  by  Dante  when  Jacopo  di  Sant'  Andrea,  who  had 
ruined  himself  by  profusion  and  committed  suicide,  scatters 
the  leaves  of  the  bush  of  Lotto  degli  Agli,  endeavouring  to 
hide  himself  among  them.  "We  shall  hereafter  examine  the 
type  completely  ;  here  I  will  only  give  an  approximate  ren- 
dering of  Homers  words,  which  have  been  obscured  more  by 
translation  than  even  by  tradition. 

94.  "They  are  overhanging  rocks.  The  great  waves  of 
blue  water  break  round  them  ;  and  the  blessed  Gods  call  them 
the  Wanderers. 

"  By  one  of  them  no  winged  thing  can  pass — not  even  the 
wild  doves  that  bring  ambrosia  to  their  father  Jove — but  the 
smooth  rock  seizes  its  sacrifice  of  them."  (Not  even  ambrosia 
to  be  had  without  Labour.  The  word  is  peculiar — as  a  part 
of  anything  is  offered  for  sacrifice  ;  especially  used  of  heave- 
offering.)  "  It  reaches  the  wide  heaven  with  its  top,  and  a 
dark  blue  cloud  rests  on  it,  and  never  passes  ;  neither  does 
the  clear  sky  hold  it,  in  summer  nor  in  harvest.  Nor  can 
any  man  climb  it — not  if  he  had  twenty  feet  and  hands,  for 
it  is  smooth  as  though  it  were  hewn. 

"And  in  the  midst  of  it  is  a  cave  which  is  turned  the  way 
of  hell.  And  therein  dwells  Scyila,  whining  for  prey  :  her 
cry,  indeed,  is  no  louder  than  that  of  a  newly-born  whelp  : 
but  she  herself  is  an  awful  thing — nor  can  any  creature  see 
her  face  and  be  glad  ;  no,  though  it  were  a  god  that  rose 
against  her.  For  she  has  twelve  feet,  all  fore-feet,  and  six 
necks,  and  terrible  heads  on  them  ;  and  each  has  three  rows 
of  teeth,  full  of  black  death. 

"  But  the  opposite  rock  is  lower  than  this,  though  but  a 
bow-shot  distant ;  and  upon  it  there  is  a  great  fig-tree,  full  of 
leaves  ;  and  under  it  the  terrible  Charybdis  sudks  down  the 
black  water.  Thrice  in  the  day  she  sucks  it  down,  and  thrice 
casts  it  up  again  :  be  not  thou  there  when  she  sucks  down,  foi 
Neptune  himself  could  not  save  thee." 


MUNERA  PULVER1S. 


[Thus  far  went  my  rambling  note,  in  Fraser's  Magazine. 
The  Editor  sent  me  a  compliment  on  it— of  which  I  was  very 
proud  ;  what  the  Publisher  thought  of  it,  I  am  not  informed  ; 
only  I  know  that  eventually  he  stopped  the  papers.    I  thin> 
a  great  deal  of  it  myself,  now,  and  have  put  it  all  in  large  ! 
accordingly,  and  should  like  to  write  more  ;  but  will, 
contrary,  self-denyingly,  and  in  gratitude  to  any  read 
has  got  through  so  much,  end  my  chapter.] 


170 


MUNERA  PULVERIS. 


CHAPTER  IV. 

COMMERCE. 

95.  As  the  currency  conveys  right  of  choice  out  of  manj 
things  in  exchange  for  one,  so  Commerce  is  the  agency  by 
which  the  the  power  of  choice  is  obtained  ;  so  that  countries 
producing  only  timber  can  obtain  for  their  timber  silk  and 
gold  ;  or,  naturally  producing  only  jewels  and  frankincense, 
can  obtain  for  them  cattle  and  corn.  In  this  function,  com- 
merce is  of  more  importance  to  a  country  in  proportion  to 
the  limitations  of  its  products,  and  the  restlessness  of  its 
fancy  ; — generally  of  greater  importance  towards  Northern 
latitudes. 

96.  Commerce  is  necessary,  however,  not  only  to  exchange 
local  products,  but  local  skill.  Labour  requiring  the  agency 
of  fire  can  only  be  given  abundantly  in  cold  countries  ;  labour 
requiring  suppleness  of  body  and  sensitiveness  of  touch,  only 
in  warm  ones ;  labour  involving  accurate  vivacity  of  thought 
only  in  temperate  ones  ;  while  peculiar  imaginative  actions 
are  produced  by  extremes  of  heat  and  cold,  and  of  light  and 
darkness.  The  production  of  great  art  is  limited  to  climates 
warm  enough  to  admit  of  repose  in  the  open  air,  and  cool 
enough  to  render  such  repose  delightful.  Minor  variations  in 
modes  of  skill  distinguish  every  locality.  The  labour  which  at 
any  place  is  easiest,  is  in  that  place  cheapest ;  and  it  becomes 
often  desirable  that  products  raised  in  one  country  should  be 
wrought  in  another.  Hence  have  arisen  discussions  on  "  Inter- 
national values  "  which  will  be  one  day  remembered  as  highly 
curious  exercises  of  the  human  mind.  For  it  will  be  discov- 
ered, in  due  course  of  tide  and  time,  that  international  value  is 
regulated  just  as  inter- provincial  or  inter-parishional  value  is. 
Coals  and  hops  are  exchanged  between  Northumberland  and 


MUNERA  PULVERIS. 


171 


Kent  on  absolutely  the  same  principles  as  iron  and  wine  be- 
tween Lancashire  and  Spain.  The  greater  breadth  of  an  arm 
of  the  sea  increases  the  cost,  but  does  not  modify  the  princi- 
ple of  exchange  ;  and  a  bargain  written  in  two  languag  es  will 
have  no  other  economical  results  than  a  bargain  written  in 
one.  The  distances  of  nations  are  measured,  not  by  seas, 
but  by  ignorances ;  and  their  divisions  determined,  not  by 
dialects,  but  by  enmities.* 

97.  Of  course,  a  system  of  international  values  may  always 
be  constructed  if  we  assume  a  relation  of  moral  law  to  physi- 
cal geography  ;  as,  for  instance,  that  it  is  right  to  cheat  or 
rob  across  a  river,  though  not  across  a  road  ;  or  across  a  sea, 
though  not  across  a  river,  &c.  ; — again,  a  system  of  such  values 
may  be  constructed  by  assuming  similar  relations  of  taxation 
to  physical  geography  ;  as,  for  instance,  that  an  article  should 
be  taxed  in  crossing  a  river,  but  not  in  crossing  a  road  ;  or 
in  being  carried  fifty  miles,  but  not  in  being  carried  five,  &c.  ; 
such  positions  are  indeed  not  easily  maintained  when  once  put 
in  logical  form  ;  but  one  law  of  international  value  is  main- 
tainable in  any  form  :  namely,  that  the  farther  your  neighbour 
lives  from  you,  and  the  less  he  understands  you,  the  more  you 
are  bound  to  he  true  in  your  dealings  with  him  ;  because  your 
power  over  him  is  greater  in  proportion  to  his  ignorance,  and 
his  remedy  more  difficult  in  proportion  to  his  distance,  f 

98.  I  have  just  said  the  breadth  of  sea  increases  the  cost  of 
exchange.  Now  note  that  exchange,  or  commerce,  in  itself,  is 
always  costly  ;  the  sum  of  the  value  of  the  goods  being  dimin- 
ished by  the  cost  of  their  conveyance,  and  by  the  maintenance 
of  the  persons  employed  in  it ;  so  that  it  is  only  when  there  is 
advantage  to  both  producers  (in  getting  the  one  thing  for  the 

[*  I  have  repeated  the  substance  of  this  and  the  next  paragraph  so 
often  since,  that  I  am  ashamed  and  weary.  The  thing  is  too  true,  and 
too  simple,  it  seems,  for  anybody  ever  to  believe.  Meantime,  the  theo- 
ries of  "  international  values, "  as  explained  by  Modern  Political  Econ- 
omy, have  brought  about  last  year's  pillage  of  France  by  Germany,  and 
the  affectionate  relations  now  existing  in  consequence  between  the  in- 
habitants of  the  right  and  left  banks  of  the  Rhine.] 

[f  I  wish  some  one  would  examine  and  publish  accurately  the  late 
dealings  of  the  Governors  of  the  Cape  with  the  Caffirs.] 


172 


MUNERA  PULVEJHS. 


other)  greater  than  the  loss  in  conveyance,  that  the  exchange 
is  expedient.  And  it  can  only  he  justly  conducted  when  the 
porters  kept  by  the  producers  (commonly  called  merchants) 
expect  mere  pay,  and  not  profit.*  For  in  just  commerce  there 
are  but  three  parties — the  two  persons  or  societies  exchang- 
ing, and  the  agent  or  agents  of  exchange  ;  the  value  of  the 
things  to  be  exchanged  is  known  by  both  the  exchangers,  and 
each  receives  equal  value,  neither  gaining  nor  losing  (for  what- 
ever one  gains  the  other  loses).  The  intermediate  agent  is 
paid  a  known  per-centage  by  both,  partly  for  labour  in  con- 
veyance, partly  for  care,  knowledge,  and  risk  ;  every  attempt 
at  concealment  of  the  amount  of  the  pay  indicates  either  ef- 
fort on  the  part  of  the  agent  to  obtain  unjust  profit,  or  effort 
on  the  part  of  the  exchangers  to  refuse  him  just  pay.  But  for 
the  most  part  it  is  the  first,  namely,  the  effort  on  the  part  of 
the  merchant  to  obtain  larger  profit  (so-called)  by  buying 
cheap  and  selling  dear.  Some  part,  indeed,  of  this  larger 
gain  is  deserved,  and  might  be  openly  demanded,  because  it 
is  the  reward  of  the  merchant's  knowledge,  and  foresight  of 
probable  necessity  ;  but  the  greater  part  of  such  gain  is  un- 
just ;  and  unjust  in  this  most  fatal  way,  that  it  depends,  first, 
on  keeping  the  exchangers  ignorant  of  the  exchange  value  of 
the  articles  ;  and,  secondly,  on  taking  advantage  of  the  buyer's 
need  and  the  seller's  poverty.  It  is,  therefore,  one  of  the  es- 
sential, and  quite  the  most  fatal,  forms  of  usury  ;  for  usury 
means  merely  taking  an  exorbitant  f  sum  for  the  use  of  any- 
thing ;  and  it  is  no  matter  whether  the  exorbitance  is  on  loan 
or  exchange,  on  rent  or  on  price — the  essence  of  the  usury 
being  that  it  is  obtained  by  advantage  of  opportunity  or  ne- 
cessity, and  not  as  due  reward  for  labour.    All  the  great 

f*  By  <lpay,"  I  mean  wages  for  labour  or  skill;  by  "profit,"  gain 
dependent  on  the  state  of  the  market.] 

[f  Since  I  wrote  this,  I  have  worked  out  the  question  of  interest  of 
money,  which  always,  until  lately,  had  embarrassed  and  defeated  me  ; 
and  I  find  that  the  payment  of  interest  of  any  amount  whatever  is  real 
44  usury,"  and  entirely  unjustifiable.  I  was  shown  this  chiefly  by  the 
pamphlets  issued  by  Mr.  W.  C.  Sillar,  though  I  greatly  regret  the  impa. 
tience  which  causes  Mr.  Sillar  to  regard  usury  as  the  radical  crime  in  po- 
litical economy.    There  are  others  worse,  that  act  with  it.] 


MU2TERA  PULVERIS. 


173 


thinkers,  therefore,  have  held  it  to  be  unnatural  and  impious, 
in  so  far  as  it  feeds  on  the  distress  of  others,  or  their  folly.  * 
Nevertheless,  attempts  to  repress  it  by  law  must  for  ever  be 
ineffective  ;  though  Plato,  Bacon,  and  the  First  Napoleon — all 
three  of  them  men  who  knew  somewhat  more  of  humanity 
than  the  "  British  merchant "  usually  does — tried  their  hands 
at  it,  and  have  left  some  (probably)  good  moderative  forms  of 
law,  which  we  will  examine  in  their  place.  But  the  only  final 
check  upon  it  must  be  radical  purifying  of  the  national  char- 
acter, for  being,  as  Bacon  calls  it,  "  concessum  propter  duri- 
tiem  cordis,"  it  is  to  be  done  away  with  by  touching  the  heart 
only  ;  not,  however,  without  medicinal  law — as  in  the  case  of 
the  other  permission,  ' 'propter  duritiem."  But  in  this  more 
than  in  anything  (though  much  in  all,  and  though  in  this  he 
would  not  himself  allow  of  their  application,  for  his  own  laws 
against  usury  are  sharp  enough),  Plato's  words  in  the  fourth 
book  of  the  Polity  are  true,  that  neither  drugs,  nor  charms, 
nor  burnings,  will  touch  a  deep-lying  political  sore,  any  more 
than  a  deep  bodily  one  ;  but  only  right  and  utter  change  of 
constitution:  and  that  4  c  they  do  but  lose  their  labour  who 
think  that  by  any  tricks  of  law  they  can  get  the  better  of 
these  mischiefs  of  commerce,  and  see  not  that  they  hew  at  a 
Hydra.  * 

99.  And  indeed  this  Hydra  seems  so  unslayable,  and  sin 
sticks  so  fast  between  the  joinings  of  the  stones  of  buying 
and  selling,  that  "  to  trade  "  in  things,  or  literally  "  cross- 
give  "  them,  has  warped  itself,  by  the  instinct  of  nations,  into 
their  worst  word  for  fraud  ;  for,  because  in  trade  there  cannot 
but  be  trust,  and  it  seems  also  that  there  cannot  but  also  be 
injury  in  answer  to  it,  what  is  merely  fraud  between  enemies 
becomes  treachery  among  friends:  and  "  trader,"  "traditor," 
and  "  traitor  "  are  but  the  same  word.  For  which  simplicity 
of  language  there  is  more  reason  than  at  first  appears  :  for 
as  in  true  commerce  there  is  no  "profit,"  so  in  true  com- 
merce there  is  no  "sale."    The  idea  of  sale  is  that  of  an 

*  Hence  Dante's  companionship  of  Cahors,  Inf.,  canto  xi.,  supported 
by  the  view  taken  of  the  matter  throughout  the  middle  ages,  in  commoB 
with  the  Greeks. 


174: 


MUNERA  PVLVERIS. 


interchange  between  enemies  respectively  endeavouring  to  get 
the  better  one  of  another ;  but  commerce  is  an  exchange  be- 
tween friends  ;  and  there  is  no  desire  but  that  it  should  be 
just,  any  more  than  there  would  be  between  members  of  the 
same  family.*  The  moment  there  is  a  bargain  over  the  pot* 
tage,  the  family  relation  is  dissolved  : — typically,  "  the  days  of 
mourning  for  my  father  are  at  hand."  Whereupon  follows 
the  resolve,  "  then  wTill  I  slay  my  brother." 

100.  This  inhumanity  of  mercenary  commerce  is  the  more 
notable  because  it  is  a  fulfilment  of  the  law  that  the  corrup- 
tion of  the  best  is  the  worst.  For  as,  taking  the  body  nat- 
ural for  symbol  of  the  body  politic,  the  governing  and  form- 
ing powers  may  be  likened  to  the  brain,  and  the  labouring 
to  the  limbs,  the  mercantile,  presiding  over  circulation  and 
communication  of  things  in  changed  utilities,  is  symbolized 
by  the  heart ;  and,  if  that  hardens,  all  is  lost.  And  this  is 
the  ultimate  lesson  which  the  leader  of  English  intellect  meant 
for  us,  (a  lesson,  indeed,  not  all  his  own,  but  part  of  the  old 
wisdom  of  humanity),  in  the  tale  of  the  Merchant  of  Venice  ; 
in  which  the  true  and  incorrupt  merchant, — kind  and  f  ree  be- 
yond every  other  Shakspearian  conception  of  men, — is  opposed 
to  the  corrupted  merchant,  or  usurer ;  the  lesson  being  deep- 
ened by  the  expression  of  the  strange  hatred  which  the  cor- 
rupted merchant  bears  to  the  pure  one,  mixed  with  intense 
scorn, — 

"  This  is  the  fool  that  lent  out  money  gratis  ;  look  to  him, 
jailer,"  (as  to  lunatic  no  less  than  criminal)  the  enmity,  ob- 
serve, having  its  symbolism  literally  carried  out  by  being 
aimed  straight  at  the  heart,  and  finally  foiled  by  a  literal  ap- 
peal to  the  great  moral  law  that  flesh  and  blood  cannot  be 
weighed,  enforced  by  "  Portia  "f  ("Portion"),  the  type  of  di- 

[*  I  do  not  wonder  when  I  re-read  this,  that  people  talk  about  my 
u  sentiment."  But  there  is  no  sentiment  whatever  in  the  matter.  It  is 
a  hard  and  bare  commercial  fact,  that  if  two  people  deal  together  wh<r 
don't  try  to  cheat  each  other,  they  will  in  a  given  time,  make  more  money 
out  of  each  other  than  if  they  do.    See  §  104.] 

f  Shakspeare  would  certainly  never  have  chosen  this  name  had  he 
heen  forced  to  retain  the  Roman  spelling.    Like  Perdita,  "lost  lady,' 


MVNERA  PULVER1S. 


175 


rate  Fortune,  found,  not  in  gold,  nor  in  silver,  but  in  lead, 
that  is  to  say,  in  endurance  and  patience,  not  in  splendour  ; 
and  finally  taught  by  her  lips  also,  declaring,  instead  of  the 
law  and  quality  of  "  merces,"  the  greater  law  and  quality  of 
mercy,  which  is  not  strained,  but  drops  as  the  rain,  blessing 
him  that  gives  and  him  that  takes.  And  observe  that  this 
"mercy''  is  not  the  mean  "Misericordia,"  but  the  mighty 
"  Gratia,"  answered  by  Gratitude,  (observe  Shy  lock's  leaning 
on  the,  to  him  detestable,  word,  gratis,  and  compare  the  re- 
lations of  Grace  to  Equity  given  in  the  second  chapter  of  the 
second  book  of  the  Memorabilia ;)  that  is  to  say,  it  is  the  gra- 
cious or  loving,  instead  of  the  strained,  or  competing  manner, 
of  doing  things,  answered,  not  only  with  "  merces  "  or  pay, 
but  with  "  merci  "  or  thanks.  And  this  is  indeed  the  mean- 
ing of  the  great  benediction  "Grace,  mercy,  and  peace,"  for 
there  can  be  no  peace  without  grace,  (not  even  by  help  of 
rifled  cannon),  nor  even  without  triplicity  of  graciousness,  for 
the  Greeks,  who  began  but  with  one  Grace,  had  to  open  their 
scheme  into  three  before  they  had  done. 

101.  With  the  usual  tendency  of  long  repeated  thought* 
to  take  the  surface  for  the  deep,  wTe  have  conceived  these 
goddesses  as  if  they  only  gave  loveliness  to  gesture  ;  whereas 

or  Cordelia,  "heart-lady,"  Portia  is  "fortune"  lady.  The  two  great 
relative  groups  of  words,  Fortuna,  fero,  and  fors — Portio,  porto,  and 
pars  (with  the  lateral  branch,  op-portune,  iin-portune,  opportunity,  &c.), 
are  of  deep  and  intricate  significance  ;  their  various  senses  of  bringing, 
abstracting,  and  sustaining  being  all  centralized  by  the  wheel  (which 
bears  and  moves  at  once),  or  still  better,  the  ball  (spera)  of  Fortune, — 
"  Volve  sua  spera,  e  beata  si  gode  :  "  the  motive  power  of  this  wheel 
distinguishing  its  goddess  from  the  fixed  majesty  of  Necessitas  with  her 
iron  nails  ;  or  avdytcr],  with  her  pillar  of  fire  and  iridescent  orbits,  fixed 
at  the  centre.  Portus  and  porta,  and  gate  in  its  connexion  with  gain, 
form  another  interesting  branch  group  ;  and  Mors,  the  concentration  of 
delaying,  is  always  to  be  remembered  with  Fors,  the  concentration  of 
bringing  and  bearing,  passing  on  into  Fortis  and  Fortitude. 

[This  note  is  literally  a  mere  memorandum  for  the  future  work  which 
I  am  now  completing  in  Fors  Olavigera  ;  it  was  printed  partly  in  vanity, 
but  also  with  real  desire  to  get  people  to  share  the  interest  I  found  in 
the  careful  study  of  the  leading  words  in  noble  languages.  Compare 
the  next  note.] 


176 


M  UN  ERA  PULVER1S. 


their  true  function  is  to  give  graciousness  to  deed,  the  othei 
loveliness  arising  naturally  out  of  that.  In  which  function 
Charis  becomes  Charitas  ;  *  and  has  a  name  and  praise  even 
greater  than  that  of  Faith  or  Truth,  for  these  may  be  main- 
tained sullenly  and  proudly  ;  but  Charis  is  in  her  countenance 
always  gladdening  (Aglaia),  and  in  her  service  instant  and 
humble  ;  and  the  true  wife  of  Vulcan,  or  Labour.  And  it  is 
not  until  her  sincerity  of  function  is  lost,  and  her  mere  beauty 
contemplated  instead  of  her  patience,  that  she  is  born  again 
of  the  foam  flake,  and  becomes  Aphrodite  ;  and  it  is  then  only 
that  she  becomes  capable  of  joining  herself  to  war  and  to  the 
enmities  of  men,  instead  of  to  labour  and  their  services. 
Therefore  the  fable  of  Mars  and  Venus  is  chosen  by  Homer, 
picturing  himself  as  Demodocus,  to  sing  at  the  games  in  the 
court  of  Alcinous.  Phaeacia  is  the  Homeric  island  of  Atlantis  ; 
an  image  of  noble  and  wise  government,  concealed,  (how 
slightly  !)  merely  by  the  change  of  a  short  vowel  for  a  long 

*  As  Charis  becomes  Charitas,  tlie  word  "  Cher,"  or  "  Dear,"  passes 
from  Shylock's  sense  of  it  (to  buy  cheap  and  sell  dear)  into  Antonio's 
sense  of  it :  emphasized  with  the  final  i  in  tender  u  Cheri,"  and  hushed 
to  English  calmness  in  our  noble  ' '  Cherish."  The  reader  must  not  think 
that  any  care  can  be  misspent  in  tracing  the  connexion  and  power  of  the 
words  which  we  have  to  use  in  the  sequel.  (See  i^ppendix  VI.)  Much 
education  sums  itself  in  making  men  economize  their  words,  and  under- 
stand them.  Nor  is  it  possible  to  estimate  the  harm  which  has  been 
done,  in  matters  of  higher  speculation  and  conduct,  by  loose  verbiage, 
though  we  may  guess  at  it  by  observing  the  dislike  which  people  show 
to  having  anything  about  their  religion  said  to  them  in  simple  words,  be- 
cause then  they  understand  it.  Thus  congregations  meet  weekly  to  in- 
voke the  influence  of  a  Spirit  of  Life  and  Truth  ;  yet  if  any  part  of  that 
character  were  intelligibly  expressed  to  them  by  the  formulas  of  the 
service,  they  would  be  offended.  Suppose,  for  instance,  in  the  closing 
benediction,  the  clergyman  were  to  give  vital  significance  to  the  vague 
word  "Holy,"  and  were  to  say,  "the  fellowship  of  the  Helpful  and 
Honest  Ghost  be  with  you,  and  remain  with  you  always,"  what  would 
be  the  horror  of  many,  first  at  the  irreverence  of  so  intelligible  an  ex- 
pression ;  and  secondly,  at  the  discomfortable  occurrence  of  the  sus- 
picion that  while  throughout  the  commercial  dealings  of  the  week  they 
had  denied  the  propriety  of  Help,  and  possibility  of  Honesty,  the  Per* 
son  whose  company  they  had  been  now  asking  to  be  blessed  with  could 
have  no  fellowship  with  cruel  people  or  knaves. 


MUNERA  PULVE1US. 


177 


one  in  the  name  of  its  queen  ;  yet  misunderstood  by  all  late? 
writers,  (even  by  Horace,  in  his  "pinguis,  Phaeaxque "). 
That  fable  expresses  the  perpetual  error  of  men  in  thinking 
that  grace  and  dignity  can  only  be  reached  by  the  soldier,  and 
never  by  the  artisan  ;  so  that  commerce  and  the  useful  arts 
have  had  the  honour  and  beauty  taken  away,  and  only  the 
Fraud  and  Pain  left  to  them,  with  the  lucre.  Which  is,  in- 
deed, one  great  reason  of  the  continual  blundering  about  the 
offices  of  government  with  respect  to  commerce.  The  higher 
classes  are  ashamed  to  employ  themselves  in  it ;  and  though 
ready  enough  to  fight  for  (or  occasionally  against)  the  people, 
— to  preach  to  them, — or  judge  them,  will  not  break  bread  for 
them  :  the  refined  upper  servant  who  has  willingly  looked 
after  the  burnishing  of  the  armoury  and  ordering  of  the 
library,  not  liking  to  set  foot  in  the  larder. 

102.  Farther  still.  As  Charis  becomes  Charitas  on  the  one 
side,  she  becomes — better  still — Chara,  Joy,  on  the  other  ; 
or  rather  this  is  her  very  mother's  milk  and  the  beauty  of  her 
childhood  ;  for  God  brings  no  enduring  Love,  nor  any  other 
good,  out  of  pain  ;  nor  out  of  contention  ;  but  out  of  joy  and 
harmony.  And  in  this  sense,  human  and  divine,  music  and 
gladness,  and  the  measures  of  both,  come  into  her  name  ; 
and  Cher  becomes  full-vowelled  Cheer,  and  Cheerful ;  and 
Chara  opens  into  Choir  and  Choral.* 

103.  And  lastly.  As  Grace  passes  into  Freedom  of  action, 
Charis  becomes  Eleutheria,  or  Liberality  ;  a  form  of  liberty 
quite  curiously  and  intensely  different  from  the  thing  usually 

*  u  tc  fxkv  ovv  &\Aa  £c3a  ovk  %X€lv  ctfcQyo'u'  twu  £y  reus  Kiiffiaeci  rd^wtr 
obdh  ara^ioot/,  ots  ftfa  pvO/mbs  uvofia  koX  an^ovla'  7];jup  5  e  o  v  s  e  ?  tt  o  /.i  e  v  robs 
Oeovs  (Apollo,  the  Muses,  and  Bacchus— the  grave  Bacchus,  that  is— 
ruling  the  choir  of  age  ;  or  Bacchus  restraining  ;  '  sseva  ie?ie,  cum  Bere- 
cyntio  cornu,  tympana,'  &c. )  cr  v  y%o  p  €vr  as  dedocrdai,  tovtovs  elvcu 
ical  rovs  SedcvKOTCLS  t\v  evpvQfxov  re  Ka\  evap{x6viov  aicrQrjaiv  (jl€6"  rjdovrts  .  .  . 
Xopovs  re  vvouaKevou  irapa  rrjs  xa^«?  €fX(bvrov  fivopa."  H  Other  animals 
have  no  perception  of  order  nor  of  disorder  in  motion  ;  but  for  us, 
Apollo  and  Bacchus  and  the  Muses  are  appointed  to  mingle  in  our 
dances  ;  and  these  are  they  who  have  given  us  the  sense  of  delight  in 
rhythm  and  harmony.  And  the  name  of  choir,  choral  dance,  (we  mav 
believe,)  came  from  chara  (delighf\'" — Laws,  book  ii. 


173 


MUNERA  PULVER1S. 


understood  by  "  Liberty"  in  modem  language  :  indeed,  much 
more  like  what  some  people  would  call  slavery  :  for  a  Greek 
always  understood,  primarily,  by  liberty,  deliverance  from  the 
lav/  of  his  own  passions  (or  from  what  the  Christian  writers 
call  bondage  of  corruption),  and  this  a  complete  liberty  :  not 
being  merely  safe  from  the  Siren,  but  also  unbound  from  the 
mast,  and  not  having  to  resist  the  passion,  but  making  it  fawn 
upon,  and  follow  him— (this  maybe  again  partly  the  meaning 
of  the  fawning  beasts  about  the  Circean  cave ;  so,  again, 
George  Herbert — 

Correct  thy  passion's  spite, 

Then  may  the  beasts  draw  thee  to  happy  light)— 

And  it  is  only  in  such  generosity  that  any  man  becomes 
capable  of  so  governing  others  as  to  take  true  part  in  any 
system  of  national  economy.  Nor  is  there  any  other  eternal 
distinction  between  the  upper  and  lower  classes  than  this 
form  of  liberty,  Eleutheria,  or  benignity,  in  the  one,  and  its 
opposite  of  slavery,  Douleia,  or  malignity,  in  the  other ;  the 
separation  of  these  two  orders  of  men,  and  the  firm  govern- 
ment of  the  lower  by  the  higher,  being  the  first  conditions  of 
possible  wealth  and  economy  in  any  state, — the  Gods  giving 
it  no  greater  gift  than  the  power  to  discern  its  true  freemen, 
and  "  malignum  spernere  vulgus." 

104  While  I  have  traced  the  finer  and  higher  laws  of  this 
matter  for  those  whom  they  concern,  I  have  also  to  note 
the  material  law — vulgarly  expressed  in  the  proverb,  "  Hon- 
esty is  the  best  policy."  That  proverb  is  indeed  wholly  inap- 
plicable to  matters  of  private  interest.  It  is  not  true  that 
honesty,  as  far  as  material  gain  is  concerned,  profits  individ- 
uals. A  clever  and  cruel  knave  will  in  a  mixed  society  al- 
ways be  richer  than  an  honest  person  can  be.  But  Honesty 
is  the  best  C£  policy,"  if  policy  mean  practice  of  State.  For 
fraud  gains  nothing  in  a  State.  It  only  enables  the  knaves  in 
it  to  live  at  the  expense  of  honest  people  ;  while  there  is  for 
every  act  of  fraud,  however  small,  a  loss  of  wealth  to  the 


MUNERA  PULVERI8. 


179 


community.  Whatever  the  fraudulent  person  gains,  soma 
other  person  loses,  as  fraud  produces  nothing  ;  and  there  is, 
besides,  the  loss  of  the  time  and  thought  spent  in  accomplish- 
ing the  fraud,  and  of  the  strength  otherwise  obtainable  by 
mutual  help  (not  to  speak  of  the  fevers  of  anxiety  and  jealousy 
in  the  blood,  which  are  a  heavy  physical  loss,  as  I  will  show  in 
due  time).  Practically,  when  the  nation  is  deeply  corrupt, 
cheat  answers  to  cheat  ;  every  one  is  in  turn  imposed  upon, 
and  there  is  to  the  body  politic  the  dead  loss  of  the  ingenuity, 
together  with  the  incalculable  mischief  of  the  injury  to  each 
defrauded  person,  producing  collateral  effect  unexpectedly. 
My  neighbour  sells  me  bad  meat :  I  sell  him  in  return  flawed 
iron.  We  neither  of  us  get  one  atom  of  pecuniary  advantage 
on  the  whole  transaction,  but  we  both  suffer  unexpected  in- 
convenience ;  my  men  get  scurvy,  and  his  cattle-truck  runs 
off  the  rails. 

105.  The  examination  of  this  form  of  Gharis  must,  there- 
fore, lead  us  into  the  discussion  of  the  principles  of  govern- 
ment in  general,  and  especially  of  that  of  the  poor  by  the 
rich,  discovering  how  the  Graciousness  joined  with  the  Great- 
ness, or  Love  with  Majestas,  is  the  true  Dei  Gratia,  or  Divine 
Eight,  of  every  form  and  manner  of  King  ;  i.  e.}  specifically, 
of  the  thrones,  dominations,  princedoms,  virtues,  and  powers 
of  the  earth  : — of  the  thrones,  stable,  or  "  ruling/'  literally 
right-doing  powers  ("rex  eris,  recte  si  facies  "  )  : — of  the  dom- 
inations— lordly,  edifying,  dominant  and  harmonious  powers  ; 
chiefly  domestic,  over  the  "  built  thing,"  domus,  or  house  ; 
and  inherently  twofold,  Dominus  and  Domina ;  Lord  and 
Lady  : — of  the  Princedoms,  pre-eminent,  incipient,  creative, 
and  demonstrative  powers  ;  thus  poetic  and  mercantile,  in  the 
"  princeps  carmen  deduxisse  "  and  the  merchant-prince  : — of 
the  Virtues  or  Courages  ;  militant,  guiding,  or  Ducal  powers  : 
• — and  finally  of  the  Strengths,  or  Forces  pure  ;  magistral  # 
powers,  of  the  More  over  the  less,  and  the  forceful  and  free 
over  the  wTeak  and  servile  elements  of  life. 

Subject  enough  for  the  next  paper,  involving  "  economical  " 
principles  of  some  importance,  of  which,  for  theme,  here  is  a 
sentence,  which  I  do  not  care  to  translate,  for  it  would  sound 


ISO 


MUNERA  PULVERIS. 


harsh  in  English,*  though,  truly,  it  is  one  of  the  tenderest 
ever  uttered  by  man  ;  which  may  be  meditated  over,  or  rather 
through,  in  the  meanwhile,  by  any  one  who  will  take  the 
pains : — 

'Ap*  ovv,  &a"n-ep  '{tittos  rca  tcueiriarrjfioui  fx\v  tyxeLP°^VTL  XP^°'^ai  Cm^1® 
hrrli/j  ovtcc  Kai  ade\(pbsy  orav  tls  avry  jxt]  imo-TdfjLevos  eyxeip  xpVa'6ah  (vpl* 
iari ; 

[*  My  way  now,  is  to  say  tilings  plainly,  if  I  can,  whether  they  sound 
harsh  or  not  ; — this  is  the  translation — "  Is  it  possible,  then,  that  as  a 
horse  is  only  a  mischief  to  any  one  who  attempts  to  use  him  without 
knowing  how,  so  also  our  brother,  if  we  attempt  to  use  him  without 
knowing  how,  may  be  a  mischief  to  us  ?"] 


MUNERA  PULVERIS. 


181 


CHAPTEK  V. 

8 

GOVERNMENT. 

106,  It  remains  for  us,  as  I  stated  in  the  close  of  the  last 
chapter,  to  examine  first  the  principles  of  government  in 
general,  and  then  those  of  the  government  of  the  Poor  by 
the  Kich. 

The  government  of  a  state  consists  in  its  customs,  laws, 
and  councils,  and  their  enforcements. 

I.  Customs. 

As  one  person  primarily  differs  from  another  by  fineness 
of  nature,  and,  secondarily,  by  fineness  of  training,  so  also, 
a  polite  nation  differs  from  a  savage  one,  first,  by  the  refine- 
ment of  its  nature,  and  secondly  by  the  delicacy  of  its  cus- 
toms. 

In  the  completeness  of  custom,  which  is  the  nation's  self- 
government,  there  are  three  stages—  first,  fineness  in  method 
of  doing  or  of  being; — called  the  manner  or  moral  of  acts; 
secondly,  firmness  in  holding  such  method  after  adoption,  so 
that  it  shall  become  a  habit  in  the  character  :  i.  e.,  a  constant 
"  having  "  or  £C  behaving  ;  "  and,  lastly,  ethical  power  in  per- 
formance and  endurance,  w7hich  is  the  skill  following  on 
habit,  and  the  ease  reached  by  frequency  of  right  doing. 

The  sensibility  of  the  nation  is  indicated  by  the  fineness  of 
its  customs ;  its  courage,  continence,  and  self-respect  by  its 
persistence  iii  them. 

By  sensibility  I  mean  its  natural  perception  of  beauty, 
fitness,  and  lightness ;  or  of  what  is  lovely,  decent,  and 
just :  faculties  dependent  much  on  race,  and  the  primal  signs 
of  fine  breeding  in  man  ;  but  cultivable  also  by  education, 
and  necessarily  perishing  without  it.  True  education  has, 
indeed,  no  other  function  than  the  development  of  these 


182 


MUNERA  PULVERI& 


faculties,  and  of  the  relative  will.  It  lias  been  the  great  erroi 
of  modern  intelligence  to  mistake  science  for  education.  You 
do  not  educate  a  man  by  telling  him  what  he  knew  not,  but 
by  making  him  what  he  was  not. 

And  making  him  what  he  will  remain  for  ever  :  for  no 
wash  of  weeds  will  bring  back  the  faded  purple.  And  in 
that  dyeing  there  are  two  processes — first,  the  cleansing  and 
wringing-out,  which  is  the  baptism  with  water  ;  and  then  the 
infusing  of  the  blue  and  scarlet  colours,  gentleness  and  justice, 
which  is  the  baptism  with  fire. 

107  *  The  customs  and  manners  of  a  sensitive  and  highly- 
trained  race  are  always  Vital  :  that  is  to  say,  they  are  orderly 
manifestations  of  intense  life,  like  the  habitual  action  of  the 
fingers  of  a  musician.  The  customs  and  manners  of  a  vile  and 
rude  race,  on  the  contrary,  are  conditions  of  decay  :  they  are 
not,  properly  speaking,  habits,  but  incrustations  ;  not  re- 
straints, or  forms,  of  life  ;  but  gangrenes,  noisome,  and  the 
beginnings  of  death. 

And  generally,  so  far  as  custom  attaches  itself  to  indolence 
instead  of  action,  and  to  prejudice  instead  of  perception,  it 
takes  this  deadly  character,  so  that  thus 

Custom  hangs  upon  us  with  a  weight 
Heavy  as  frost,  and  deep  almost  as  life. 

But  that  weight,  if  it  become  impetus,  (living  instead  of 
dead  weight)  is  just  what  gives  value  to  custom,  when  it 
works  with  life,  instead  of  against  it. 

108.  The  high  ethical  training  of  a  nation  implies  perfect 
Grace,  Pitifulness,  and  Peace ;  it  is  irreconcilably  inconsistent 
with  filthy  or  mechanical  employments, — with  the  desire  of 
money, — and  with  mental  states  of  anxiety,  jealous}',  or  in- 
difference to  pain.  The  present  insensibility  of  the  upper 
classes  of  Europe  to  the  surrounding  aspects  of  suffering, 
uncleanness,  and  crime,  binds  them  not  only  into  one  response 
bility  with  the  sin,  but  into  one  dishonour  with  the  foulness, 

[*  Think  over  this  paragraph  carefully;  it  should  have  been  much 
expanded  to  be  quite  intelligible  but  it  contains  all  that  I  want  it  to 
contain.] 


MUNERA  PULVERIS. 


183 


which  rot  at  their  thresholds.  The  crimes  daily  recorded  in 
the  police-courts  of  London  and  Paris  (and  much  more  those 
which  are  i^recorded)  are  a  disgrace  to  the  whole  body  poli- 
tic ;  *  they  are,  as  in  the  body  natural,  stains  of  disease  on  a 
face  of  delicate  skin,  making  the  delicacy  itself  frightful. 
Similarly,  the  filth  and  poverty  permitted  or  ignored  in  the 
midst  of  us  are  as  dishonourable  to  the  whole  social  body,  as 
in  the  body  natural  it  is  to  wash  the  face,  but  leave  the  hands 
and  feet  foul.  Christ's  way  is  the  only  true  one  :  begin  at  the 
feet ;  the  face  will  take  care  of  itself. 

109.  Yet,  since  necessarily,  in  the  frame  of  a  nation,  noth- 
ing but  the  head  can  be  of  gold,  and  the  feet,  for  the  work 
they  have  to  do,  must  be  part  of  iron,  part  of  clay  ; — foul  or 
mechanical  work  is  always  reduced  by  a  noble  race  to  the 
minimum  in  quantity  ;  and,  even  then,  performed  and  en- 
dured, not  without  sense  of  degradation,  as  a  fine  temper  is 
wounded  by  the  sight  of  the  lower  offices  of  the  body.  The 
highest  conditions  of  human  society  reached  hitherto  have 
cast  such  work  to  slaves  ;  but  supposing  slavery  of  a  politi- 
cally defined  kind  to  be  done  away  with,  mechanical  and  foul 
employment  must,  in  all  highly  organized  states,  take  the  as- 
pect either  of  punishment  or  probation.  All  criminals  should 
at  once  be  set  to  the  most  dangerous  and  painful  forms  of  it, 
especially  to  work  in  mines  and  at  furnaces,  f  so  as  to  relieve 

*  "The  ordinary  brute,  who  flourishes  in  the  very  centre  of  ornate 
life,  tells  us  of  unknown  depths  on  the  verge  of  which  we  totter,  being 
bound  to  thank  our  stars  every  day  we  live  that  there  is  not  a  general 
outbreak,  and  a  revolt  from  the  yoke  of  civilization. " — Times  leader, 
Dec.  25,  1862.  Admitting  that  our  stars  are  to  be  thanked  for  our  safety, 
whom  are  we  to  thank  for  the  danger  ? 

f  Our  politicians,  even  the  best  of  them,  regard  only  the  distress 
caused  by  the  failure  of  mechanical  labour.  The  degradation  caused 
by  its  excess  is  a  far  more  serious  subject  of  thought,  and  of  future  fear. 
I  shall  examine  this  part  of  our  subject  at  length  hereafter.  There  can 
hardly  be  any  doubt,  at  present,  cast  on  the  truth  of  the  above  passages, 
as  all  the  great  thinkers  are  unanimous  on  the  matter.  Plato's  words 
are  terrific  in  their  scorn  and  pity  whenever  he  touches  on  the  mechan- 
ical arts.  He  calls  the  men  employed  in  them  not  even  human,  but 
partially  and  diminutively  human,  "&tyK»x|*jro«»"  and  opposes  such 
work  to  noble  occupations,  not  merely  as  prison  is  opposed  to  freedom 


M  UN  ERA  PULVERIS. 


the  innocent  population  as  far  as  possible :  of  merely  rougli 
(not  mechanical)  manual  labour,  especially  agricultural,  a  largos 
portion  should  be  done  by  the  upper  classes  ; — bodily  health,  and 
sufficient  contrast  and  repose  for  the  mental  functions,  being  W- 
atlainable  without  it  ;  what  necessarily  inferior  labour  remains 
to  be  done,  as  especially  in  manufactures,  should,  and  always 
will,  when  the  relations  of  society  are  reverent  and  harmoni- 
ous, fall  to  the  lot  of  those  who,  for  the  time,  are  fit  for  noth- 
ing better.  For  as,  whatever  the  perfectness  of  the  educa- 
tional system,  there  must  remain  infinite  differences  between 
the  natures  and  capacities  of  men  ;  and  these  differing  natures 
are  generally  rangeable  under  the  two  qualities  of  lordly,  (or 
tending  towards  rule,  construction,  and  harmony),  and  servile 
(or  tending  towards  misrule,  destruction,  and  discord)  ;  and, 

but  as  a  convict's  dishonoured  prison  is  to  the  temple  (escape  from  them 
"being  like  that  of  a  criminal  to  the  sanctuary)  ;  and  the  destruction 
caused  by  them  being  of  soul  no  less  than  body. — Rep.  vi.  9.  Compare 
Laws,  v.  11.  Xenophon  dwells  on  the  evil  of  occupations  at  the  fur- 
nace and  especially  their  "  ocrxoA-fo,  want  of  leisure." — Econ,  i.  4. 
(Modern  England,  with  all  its  pride  of  education,  has  lost  that  first  sense 
of  the  word  "school  ;M  and  till  it  recover  that,  it  will  find  no  other 
rightly.)  His  word  for  the  harm  to  the  soul  is  to  "  break  "  it,  as  we  say 
of  the  heart. — Econ.  i.  6.  And  herein,  also,  is  the  root  of  the  scorn, 
otherwise  apparently  most  strange  and  cruel,  with  which  Homer,  Dante, 
and  Shakspeare  always  speak  of  the  populace  •  for  it  is  entirely  true 
that,  in  great  states,  the  lower  orders  are  low  by  nature  as  well  as  by 
task,  being  precisely  that  part  of  the  commonwealth  which  has  been 
thrust  down  for  its  coarseness  or  unworthiness  (by  coarseness  I  mean 
especially  insensibility  and  irreverence — the  "  profane  "  of  Horace); 
and  when  this  ceases  to  be  so,  and  the  corruption  and  profanity  are  in 
the  higher  instead  of  the  lower  orders,  there  arises,  first,  helpless  confu* 
sion  ,  then,  if  the  lower  classes  deserve  power,  ensues  swift  revolution, 
and  they  get  it ;  but  if  neither  the  populace  nor  their  rulers  deserve  it, 
there  follows  mere  darkness  and  dissolution,  till,  out  of  the  putrid  ele- 
ments, some  new  capacity  of  order  rises,  like  grass  on  a  grave ;  if  not, 
there  is  no  more  hope,  nor  shadow  of  turning,  for  that  nation.  Atropoa 
has  her  way  with  it. 

So  that  the  law  of  national  health  is  like  that  of  a  great  lake  or  sea, 
in  perfect  but  slow  circulation,  letting  the  dregs  fall  continually  to  the 
lowest  place,  and  the  clear  water  rise  ;  yet  so  as  that  there  shall  be  no 
neglect  of  the  lower  orders,  but  perfect  supervision  and  sympathy,  bo 
that  if  one  member  suffer,  all  members  shall  suffer  with  it. 


MUJSfERA  PUL  VERTS. 


185 


since  the  lordly  part  is  only  in  a  state  of  profitableness  while 
ruling,  and  the  servile  only  in  a  state  of  redeemableness  while 
serving,  the  whole  health  of  the  state  depends  on  the  mani- 
fest separation  of  these  two  elements  of  its  mind ;  for,  if  the 
servile  part  be  not  separated  and  rendered  visible  in  service, 
it  mixes  with,  and  corrupts,  the  entire  body  of  the  state  ;  and 
if  the  lordly  part  be  not  distinguished,  and  set  to  rule,  it  is 
crushed  and  lost,  being  turned  to  no  account,  so  that  the 
rarest  qualities  of  the  nation  are  all  given  to  it  in  vain.* 

II.  Laws. 

110.  These  are  the  definitions  and  bonds  of  custom,  or  of 
what  the  nation  desires  should  become  custom. 

Law  is  either  archic,  f  (of  direction),  meristic,  (of  division), 
or  critic,  (of  judgment). 

Archie  law  is  that  of  appointment  and  precept :  it  defines 
what  is  and  is  not  to  be  done. 

Meristic  law  is  that  of  balance  and  distribution :  it  defines 
what  is  and  is  not  to  be  possessed. 

Critic  law  is  that  of  discernment  and  award  :  it  defines 
what  is  and  is  not  to  be  suffered. 

III.  A.  Archic  Law.  If  we  choose  to  unite  the  laws  of 
precept  and  distribution  under  the  head  of  "  statutes,"  all  law 

*  u  oAlyiis,  Ka\  yiyvofxevrjs."    (Little,  and  that  little  born  in  vain.) 

The  bitter  sentence  never  was  so  true  as  at  this  day. 

[f  This  following  note  is  a  mere  cluster  of  memoranda,  but  I  keep  it 
for  reference.]  Thetic,  or  Thesmic,  would  perhaps  be  abetter  term 
than  archic ;  but  liable  to  be  confused  with  some  which  we  shall  want 
relating  to  Theoria.  The  administrators  of  the  three  great  divisions  of 
law  are  severally  Archons  Merists,  and  Dicasts.  The  Archons  are  the 
true  princes,  or  beginners  of  things  ;  or  leaders  (as  of  an  orchestra). 
The  Merists  are  properly  the  Domini,  or  Lords  of  houses  and  nations. 
The  Dicasts,  properly,  the  judges,  and  that  with  Olympian  justice, 
which  reaches  to  heaven  and  hell.  The  violation  of  archic  law  is  a^apria 
(error),  irov^pia.  (failure or  TrXyix/uLiXsia  (discord).  The  violation  of  mer- 
istic law  is  avof.ua  (iniquity).  The  violation  of  critic  law  is  adtKia  (injury) 
Iniquity  is  the  central  generic  term  ;  for  all  law  is  fatal  ;  it  is  the  divi- 
sion to  men  of  their  fate  ;  as  the  fold  of  their  pasture,  it  is  vo\xos  ;  as  the 
assigning  of  their  portion,  (uo?/?a. 


18G 


MUNERA  PULVERI3. 


is  simply  either  of  statute  or  judgment  ;  that  is,  first  the  es- 
tablishment of  ordinance,  and,  secondly,  the  assignment  ol 
the  reward,  or  penalty,  due  to  its  observance  or  violation. 

To  some  extent  these  two  forms  of  law  must  be  associated, 
and,  with  every  ordinance,  the  penalty  of  disobedience  to  it 
be  also  determined.  But  since  the  degrees  and  guilt  of  diso- 
bedience vary,  the  determination  of  due  reward  and  punish- 
ment must  be  modified  by  discernment  of  special  fact,  which 
is  peculiarly  the  office  of  the  judge,  as  distinguished  from 
that  of  the  lawgiver  and  law-sustainer,  or  king  ;  not  but  that 
the  two  offices  are  always  theoretically,  and  in  early  stages, 
or  limited  numbers,  of  society,  are  often  practically,  united  in 
the  same  person  or  persons. 

112.  Also,  it  is  necessary  to  keep  clearly  in  view  the  dis- 
tinction between  these  two  kinds  of  law,  because  the  possible 
range  of  law  is  wider  in  proportion  to  their  separation.  There 
are  many  points  of  conduct  respecting  which  the  nation  may 
wisely  express  its  will  by  a  written  precept  or  resolve,  yet  not 
enforce  it  by  penalty :  *  and  the  expedient  degree  of  penalty 
is  always  quite  a  separate  consideration  from  the  expedience 
of  the  statute  ;  for  the  statute  may  often  be  better  enforced 
by  mercy  than  severity,  and  is  also  easier  in  the  bearing,  and 
less  likely  to  be  abrogated.  Farther,  laws  of  precept  have 
reference  especially  to  youth,  and  concern  themselves  with 
training  ;  but  laws  of  judgment  to  manhood,  and  concern 
themselves  with  remedy  and  reward.  There  is  a  highly  curi- 
ous feeling  in  the  English  mind  against  educational  law  :  wre 
think  no  man's  liberty  should  be  interfered  with  till  he  has 
done  irrevocable  wrong  ;  whereas  it  is  then  just  too  late  for 
the  only  gracious  and  kingly  interference,  which  is  to  hinder 
him  from  doing  it.    Make  your  educational  laws  strict,  and 

[*  This  is  the  only  sentence  which,  in  revising  these  essays,  I  am  now 
inclined  to  question  ;  hut  the  point  is  one  of  extreme  difficulty.  There 
might  be  a  law,  for  instance,  of  curfew,  that  candles  should  he  put  out, 
unless  for  necessary  service,  at  such  and  such  an  hour,  the  idea  of 
"  necessary  service"  being  quite  indefinable,  and  no  penalty  possible  ; 
yet  there  would  be  a  distinct  consciousness  of  illegal  conduct  in  young 
ladies*  minds  who  danced  by  candlelight  till  dawn.] 


M  UN  ERA  PULVERIS. 


1S7 


your  criminal  ones  may  be  gentle  ;  but,  leave  youth  its  liberty 
and  you  will  have  to  dig  dungeons  for  age.  And  it  is  good 
for  a  man  that  he  "  wear  the  yoke  in  his  youth  : "  for  the 
reins  may  then  be  of  silken  thread  ;  and  with  sweet  chime  of 
silver  bells  at  the  bridle ;  but,  for  the  captivity  of  age,  you 
must  forge  the  iron  fetter,  and  cast  the  passing  bell. 

113.  Since  no  law  can  be,  in  a  final  or  true  sense,  estab- 
lished, but  by  right,  (all  unjust  laws  involving  the  ultimate 
necessity  of  their  own  abrogation),  the  law-giving  can  only 
become  a  law-sustaining  power  in  so  far  as  it  is  Royal,  or 
"  right  doing ; " — in  so  far,  that  is,  as  it  rules,  not  mis- 
rules, and  orders,  not  dis-orders,  the  things  submitted  to  it. 
Throned  on  this  rock  of  justice,  the  kingly  power  becomes 
established  and  establishing  ;  t£  Befas"  or  divine,  and,  there- 
fore, it  is  literally  true  that  no  ruler  can  err,  so  long  as  he  is  a 
ruler,  or  ap^v  ovSels  a^apravu  totc  orav  up^wv  rj  ;  perverted  by 
careless  thought,  wThich  has  cost  the  world  somewhat,  into— 
' '  the  king  can  do  no  wrong.5' 

114.  B.  Meristic  Law,*  or  that  of  the  tenure  of  property, 
first  determines  what  every  individual  possesses  by  right,  and 
secures  it  to  him  ;  and  what  he  possesses  by  wrong,  and  de- 
prives him  of  it.  But  it  has  a  far  higher  provisory  function  : 
it  determines  what  every  man  should  possess,  and  puts  it 
within  his  reach  on  due  conditions  ;  and  what  he  should  not 
possess,  and  puts  this  out  of  his  reach,  conclusively. 

115.  Every  article  of  human  wealth  has  certain  conditions 
attached  to  its  merited  possession  ;  when  these  are  unob- 
served, possession  becomes  rapine.  And  the  object  of  meris- 
tic law  is  not  only  to  secure  to  every  man  his  rightful  share 
(the  share,  that  is,  which  he  has  worked  for,  produced,  or  re- 
3eived  by  gift  from  a  rightful  owner),  but  to  enforce  the  due 
conditions  of  possession,  as  far  as  law  may  conveniently  reach  .* 
for  instance,  that  land  shall  not  be  wantonly  allowed  to  run 
to  waste,  that  streams  shall  not  be  poisoned  by  the  persons 
through  whose  properties  they  pass,  nor  air  be  rendered  un- 

[*  Read  tliis  and  the  next  paragraph  with  attention  ;  they  contain 
slear  statements,  which  I  cannot  mend,  of  things  most  necessary.] 


183 


MUNERA  PULVERIS. 


wholesome  beyond  given  limits.  Laws  of  this  kind  exist  al 
ready  in  rudimentary  degree,  but  need  large  development : 
the  just  laws  respecting  the  possession  of  works  of  art  have 
not  hitherto  been  so  much  as  conceived,  and  the  daily  loss  of 
national  wealth,  and  of  its  use,  in  this  respect,  is  quite  incal- 
culable. And  these  laws  need  revision  quite  as  much  respect- 
ing property  in  national  as  in  private  hands.  For  instance  : 
the  public  are  under  a  vague  impression  that,  because  they 
have  paid  for  the  contents  of  the  British  Museum,  every  one 
has  an  equal  right  to  see  and  to  handle  them.  But  the  pub- 
lic have  similarly  paid  for  the  contents  of  Woolwich  arsenal  v 
yet  do  not  expect  free  access  to  it,  or  handling  of  its  contents. 
The  British  Museum  is  neither  a  free  circulating  library,  nor 
a  free  school :  it  is  a  place  for  the  safe  preservation,  and  ex- 
hibition on  due  occasion,  of  unique  books,  unique  objects  of 
natural  history,  and  unique  works  of  art ;  its  books  can  no 
more  be  used  by  everybody  than  its  coins  can  be  handled,  or 
its  statues  cast.  There  ought  to  be  free  libraries  in  every 
quarter  of  London,  with  large  and  complete  reading-rooms 
attached ;  so  also  free  educational  museums  should  be  open 
in  every  quarter  of  London,  all  day  long,  until  late  at  night, 
well  lighted,  well  catalogued,  and  rich  in  contents  both  of  art 
and  natural  history.  But  neither  the  British  Museum  nor 
National  Gallery  is  a  school  ;  they  are  treasuries  ;  and  both 
should  be  severely  restricted  in  access  and  in  use.  Unless 
some  order  of  this  kind  is  made,  and  that  soon,  for  the  MSS. 
department  of  the  Museum,  (its  superintendents  have  sorrow- 
fully told  me  this,  and  repeatedly),  the  best  MSS.  in  the  col- 
lection will  be  destroyed,  irretrievably,  by  the  careless  and 
continual  handling  to  which  they  are  now  subjected. 

Finally,  in  certaiu  conditions  of  a  nation's  progress,  laws 
limiting  accumulation  of  any  kind  of  property  may  be  found 
expedient. 

116.  C.  Critic  Law  determines  questions  of  injury,  and 
assigns  due  rewards  and  punishments  to  conduct. 

Two  curious  economical  questions  arise  laterally  with  re- 
spect to  this  branch  of  law,  namely,  the  cost  of  crime,  and 


MUNERA  PULVERI8. 


the  cost  of  judgment.  The  cost  of  crime  is  endured  by  na- 
tions ignorantly,  that  expense  being  nowhere  stated  in  their 
budgets  ;  the  cost  of  judgment,  patiently,  (provided  only  it  can 
be  had  pure  for  the  money),  because  the  science,  or  perhaps 
we  ought  rather  to  say  the  art,  of  law,  is  felt  to  found  a  noble 
profession  and  discipline  ;  so  that  civilized  nations  are  usually 
glad  that  a  number  of  persons  should  be  supported  by  exer- 
cise in  oratory  and  analysis.  But  it  has  not  yet  been  calcu- 
lated what  the  practical  value  might  have  been,  in  other  di- 
rections, of  the  intelligence  now  occupied  in  deciding,  through 
courses  of  years,  what  might  have  been  decided  as  justly,  had 
the  date  of  judgment  been  fixed,  in  as  many  hours.  Imagine 
one  half  of  the  funds  which  any  great  nation  devotes  to  dis- 
pute by  law,  applied  to  the  determination  of  physical  ques- 
tions in  medicine,  agriculture,  and  theoretic  science  ;  and 
calculate  the  probable  results  within  the  next  ten  years  ! 

I  say  nothing  yet  of  the  more  deadly,  more  lamentable  loss, 
involved  in  the  use  of  purchased,  instead  of  personal,  justice 

« — 6i  iircLKTia  Trap  aWwv — airopta  otK€iW." 

117.  In  order  to  true  analysis  of  critic  law,  we  must  under- 
stand the  real  meaning  of  the  word  "  injury." 

We  commonly  understand  by  it,  any  kind  of  harm  done  by 
one  man  to  another ;  but  we  do  not  define  the  idea  of  harm  : 
sometimes  we  limit  it  to  the  harm  which  the  sufferer  is  con- 
scious of ;  whereas  much  the  worst  injuries  are  those  he  is 
imconscious  of  ;  and,  at  other  times,  we  limit  the  idea  to  vio- 
lence, or  restraint ;  whereas  much  the  worse  forms  of  injury 
are  to  be  accomplished  by  indolence,  and  the  withdrawal  oi 
restraint. 

118.  "Injury  "is  then  simply  the  refusal,  or  violation  of, 
any  man's  right  or  claim  upon  his  fellows  :  which  claim,  much 
talked  of  in  modern  times,  under  the  term  " right,"  is  mainly 
resolvable  into  two  branches :  a  man's  claim  not  to  be  hin- 
dered from  doing  what  he  should  ;  and  his  claim  to  be  hin- 
dered from  doing  what  he  should  not ;  these  two  forms  of 
hindrance  being  intensified  by  reward,  help,  and  fortune,  or 
Fors,  on  one  side,  and  by  punishment;  impediment,  and  ejm 
final  arrest,  or  Mors,  on  the  other, 


190 


MUNEHA  PULVERIS. 


119.  Now,  in  order  to  a  man's  obtaining  these  two  rights 
it  is  clearly  needful  that  the  worth  of  him  should  be  approxi- 
mately known  ;  as  well  as  the  want  of  worth,  which  has,  un- 
happily, been  usually  the  principal  subject  of  study  for  critic 
law,  careful  hitherto  only  to  mark  degrees  of  de-merit,  instead 
of  merit ; — assigning,  indeed,  to  the  Deficiencies  (not  always, 
alas  !  even  to  these)  just  estimate,  fine,  or  penalty  ;  but  to 
the  i^nciencies,  on  the  other  side,  which  are  by  much  the 
more  interesting,  as  well  as  the  only  profitable  part  of  its 
subject,  assigning  neither  estimate  nor  aid. 

120.  Now,  it  is  in  this  higher  and  perfect  function  of  critic 
law,  cabling  instead  of  disabling,  that  it  becomes  truly 
Kingly,  instead  of  Draconic :  (what  Providence  gave  the 
great,  wrathful  legislator  his  name  ?) :  that  is,  it  becomes  the 
law  of  man  and  of  life,  instead  of  the  law  of  the  worm  and  of 
death — both  of  these  laws  being  set  in  changeless  poise  one 
against  another,  and  the  enforcement  of  both  being  the  eternal 
function  of  the  lawgiver,  and  true  claim  of  every  living  soul : 
such  claim  being  indeed  strong  to  be  mercifully  hindered, 
and  even,  if  need  be,  abolished,  when  longer  existence  means 
only  deeper  destruction,  but  stronger  still  to  be  mercifully 
helped,  and  recreated,  when  longer  existence  and  new  crea- 
tion mean  nobler  life.  So  that  reward  and  punishment  will 
be  found  to  resolve  themselves  mainly*  into  help  and  hin- 
drance ;  and  these  again  will  issua  naturally  from  true  recog- 
nition of  deserving,  and  the  just  reverence  and  just  wrath 
which  follow  instinctively  on  such  recognition. 

121.  I  say,  "  follow,"  but,  in  reality,  they  are  part  of  the 
recognition.  Keverence  is  as  instinctive  as  anger  ; — both  of 
them  instant  on  true  vision  :  it  is  sight  and  understanding 
that  we  have  to  teach,  and  these  are  reverence.  Make  a  man 
perceive  worth,  and  in  its  reflection  he  sees  his  own  relative 
unworth,  and  worships  thereupon  inevitably,  not  with  stiff 
courtesy,  but  rejoicingly,  passionately,  and,  best  of  all,  rest" 
fully :  for  the  inner  capacity  of  awe  and  love  is  infinite  in 

[*  Mainly  ;  not  altogether,  Conclusive  reward  of  high  virtue  is 
loving  and  crowning,  not  helping  ;  and  conclusive  punishment  of  deep 
Vice  is  hating  and  crushing,  not  merely  hindering  ] 


MUNERA  PULVERIS. 


191 


man  *,  and  onlj  in  finding  these,  can  we  find  peace.  And  the 
common  insolences  and  petulances  of  the  people,  and  their 
talk  of  equality,  are  not  irreverence  in  them  in  the  least,  but 
mere  blindness,  stupefaction,  and  fog  in  the  brains,*  the  first 
sign  of  any  cleansing  away  of  which  is,  that  they  gain  some 
power  of  discerning,  and  some  patience  in  submitting  to, 
their  true  counsellors  and  governors.  In  the  mode  of  such 
discernment  consists  the  real  "  constitution "  of  the  state, 
more  than  in  the  titles  or  offices  of  the  discerned  person  ;  for 
it  is  no  matter,  save  in  degree  of  mischief,  to  what  office  a 
man  is  appointed,  if  he  cannot  fulfil  it. 

122.  III.  Government  by  Council. 

This  is  the  determination,  by  living  authority,  of  the  na- 
tional conduct  to  be  observed  under  existing  circumstances  ; 
and  the  modification  or  enlargement,  abrogation  or  enforce- 
ment, of  the  code  of  national  law  according  to  present  needs 
or  purposes.  This  government  is  necessarily  always  by  coun- 
cil, for  though  the  authority  of  it  may  be  vested  in  one  per- 
son, that  person  cannot  form  any  opinion  on  a  matter  of  pub- 
lic interest  but  by  (voluntarily  or  involuntarily)  submitting 
himself  to  the  influence  of  others. 

This  goverment  is  always  twofold — visible  and  invisible. 

The  visible  government  is  that  which  nominally  carries  on 
the  national  business  ;  determines  its  foreign  relations,  raises 
taxes,  levies  soldiers,  orders  war  or  peace,  and  otherwise  be- 
comes the  arbiter  of  the  national  fortune.  The  invisible 
government  is  that  exercised  by  all  energetic  and  intelligent 
men,  each  in  his  sphere,  regulating  the  inner  will  and  secret 
ways  of  the  people,  essentially  forming  its  character,  and  pre- 
paring its  fate. 

Visible  governments  are  the  toys  of  some  nations,  the  dis- 
eases of  others,  the  harness  of  some,  the  burdens  of  more{ 

*  Compare  Chaucer's  u  villany  "  (clownishness), 
Full  foul  and  chorlishe  seemed  she. 
And  eke  villanous  for  to  be, 
And  little  cmilde  of  norture 
To  worship  any  creatures. 


193 


MUNERA  PULVERI8. 


the  necessity  of  all.  Sometimes  their  career  is  quite  distinct 
from  that  of  the  people,  and  to  write  it,  as  the  national  his- 
tory, is  as  if  one  should  number  the  accidents  which  befall  a 
man's  weapons  and  wardrobe,  and  call  the  list  his  biography. 
Nevertheless,  a  truly  noble  and  wise  nation  necessarily  has  a 
noble  and  wise  visible  government,  for  its  wisdom  issues  in 
that  conclusively. 

123.  Visible  governments  are,  in  their  agencies,  capable  of 
three  pure  forms,  and  of  no  more  than  three. 

They  are  either  monarchies,  where  the  authority  is  vested 
in  one  person  ;  oligarchies,  when  it  is  vested  in  a  minority  ; 
or  democracies,  when  vested  in  a  majority. 

But  these  three  forms  are  not  only,  in  practice,  variously 
limited  and  combined,  but  capable  of  infinite  difference  in 
character  and  use,  receiving  specific  names  according  to  their 
variations  ;  which  names,  being  nowise  agreed  upon,  nor  con- 
sistently used,  either  in  thought  or  writing,  no  man  can  at 
present  tell,  in  speaking  of  any  kind  of  government,  whether 
he  is  understood  ;  nor,  in  hearing,  whether  he  understands. 
Thus  we  usually  call  a  just  government  by  one  person  a  mon- 
archy, and  an  unjust  or  cruel  one,  a  tyranny  :  this  might  be 
reasonable  if  it  had  reference  to  the  divinity  of  true  govern- 
ment ;  but  to  limit  the  term  "  oligarchy  "  to  government  by 
a  few  rich  people,  and  to  call  government  by  a  few  wise  or 
noble  people  "  aristocracy,"  is  evidently  absurd,  unless  it  were 
proved  that  rich  people  never  could  be  wise,  or  noble  people 
rich  ;  and  farther  absurd,  because  there  are  other  distinctions 
in  character,  as  well  as  riches  or  wisdom  (greater  purity  of 
race,  or  strength  of  purpose,  for  instance),  which  may  give 
the  power  of  government  to  the  few.  So  that  if  we  had  to 
give  names  to  every  group  or  kind  of  minority,  we  should 
have  verbiage  enough.  But  there  is  only  one  right  name— 
"  oligarchy. " 

124.  So  also  the  terms  "  republic  "  and  cc  democracy  "  *  are 

[*  I  leave  this  paragraph,  in  every  syllable,  as  it  was  written,  during 
the  rage  of  the  American  war  ;  it  was  meant  to  refer,  however,  chiefly 
to  the  Northerns:  what  modifications  its  hot  and  partial  terms  require  I 
will  give  in  another  place :  let  it  stand  nere  as  it  stood.] 


MUNERA  PULVEPJS. 


193 


confused,  especially  in  modern  use  ;  and  both  of  them  are 
liable  to  every  sort  of  misconception.  A  republic  means, 
properly,  a  polity  in  which  the  state,  with  its  all,  is  at  every 
man's  service,  and  every  man,  with  his  all,  at  the  state's  ser- 
vice— (people  are  apt  to  lose  sight  of  the  last  condition),  but 
its  government  may  nevertheless  be  oligarchic  (consular,  or 
decemviral,  for  instance),  or  monarchic  (dictatorial).  But  a 
democracy  means  a  state  in  which  the  government  rests 
directly  with  the  majority  of  the  citizens.  And  both  these 
conditions  have  been  judged  only  by  such  accidents  and 
aspects  of  them  as  each  of  us  has  had  experience  of ;  and 
sometimes  both  have  been  confused  with  anarchy,  as  it  is  the 
fashion  at  present  to  talk  of  the  "  failure  of  republican  insti- 
tutions in  America,"  when  there  has  never  yet  been  in  America 
any  such  thing  as  an  institution,  but  only  defiance  of  institu- 
tion ;  neither  any  such  thing  as  a  res-publica,  but  only  a  mul- 
titudinous res-'primta  ;  every  man  for  himself.  It  is  not  re- 
publicanism which  fails  now  in  America  ;  it  is  your  model 
science  of  political  economy,  brought  to  its  perfect  practice. 
There  you  may  see  competition,  and  the  "  law  of  demand  and 
supply  "  (especially  in  paper),  in  beautiful  and  unhindered 
operation/*  Lust  of  wealth,  and  trust  in  it  ;  vulgar  faith  in 
magnitude  and  multitude,  instead  of  nobleness  ;  besides  that 
faith  natural  to  backwoodsmen — "lucum  ligna,"f — perpetual 
self-contemplation,  issuing  in  passionate  vanity ;  total  igno- 
rance of  the  finer  and  higher  arts,  and  of  all  that  they  teach 
and  bestow  ;  and  the  discontent  of  energetic  minds  unoccu- 
pied, frantic  with  hope  of  uncomprehended  change,  and  prog- 
ress they  know  not  whither  ;  J — these  are  the  things  that 

*  Supply  and  demand !  Alas  !  for  what  noble  work  was  there  ever 
any  audible  "demand"  in  that  poor  sense  (Past  and  Fresent)  ?  Nay, 
the  demand  is  not  loud,  even  for  ignoble  work.  See  u  Average  Earnings 
of  Betty  Taylor,"  in  Times  of  4th  February  of  this  year  [1868]: 
"  Worked  from  Monday  morning  at  8  A.M.  to  Friday  night  at  5.30  p.m. 
for  Is.  5£tf.* — Laissez  faire.  [This  kind  of  slavery  finds  no  Abolitionists 
that  I  hear  of.] 

[f  "  That  the  sacred  grove  is  nothing  but  logs."] 

\  Ames,  by  report  of  Waldo  Emerson,  says  that  a  monarchy  is  a 
merchantman,  which  sails  wells  but  will  sometimes  strike  on  a  rock,  and 


MVJSEliA  PUL  VEHTS. 


have  "  failed  "  in  America  ;  and  yet  not  altogether  failed— it 
is  not  collapse,  but  collision  ;  the  greatest  railroad  accident 
on  record,  with  fire  caught  from  the  furnace,  and  Catiline's 
quenching  "  non  aqua,  sed  ruina."  *  But  I  see  not,  in  any  of 
our  talk  of  them,  justice  enough  done  to  their  erratic  strength 
of  purpose,  nor  any  estimate  taken  of  the  strength  of  endur- 
ance of  domestic  sorrow,  in  what  their  women  and  children 
suppose  a  righteous  cause.  And  out  of  that  endurance  and 
suffering,  its  own  fruit  will  be  born  with  time  ;  [not  abolition 
of  slavery,  however.  See  §  130.]  and  Carlyle's  prophecy  of 
them  (June,  1850),  as  it  has  now  come  true  in  the  first  clause, 
will,  in  the  last : — 

"  America,  too,  will  find  that  caucuses,  divisionaiists,  stump- 
oratory,  and  speeches  to  Buncombe  will  not  carry  men  to  the 
immortal  gods  ;  that  the  Washington  Congress,  and  constitu- 
tional battle  of  Kilkenny  cats  is  there,  as  here,  naught  for 
such  objects  ;  quite  incompetent  for  such  ;  and,  in  fine,  that 
said  sublime  constitutional  arrangement  will  require  to  be 
(with  terrible  throes,  and  travail  such  as  few  expect  yet)  re- 
modelled, abridged,  extended,  suppressed,  torn  asunder,  put 
together  again — not  without  heroic  labour  and  effort,  quite 
other  than  that  of  the  stump-orator  and  the  revival  preacher, 
one  clay." 

125.*}-  Understand,  then,  once  for  all,  that  no  form  of  gov- 
ernment, provided  it  be  a  government  at  all,  is,  as  such,  to  be 
either  condemned  or  praised,  or  contested  for  in  anywise,  but 

go  to  the  bottom  ;  whilst  a  republic  is  a  raft,  which  would  never  sink, 
but  tlien  jour  feet  are  always  in  the  water."  Yes,  that  is  comfortable  ; 
and  though  your  raft  cannot  sink  (being  too  worthless  for  that),  it  may 
go  to  pieces,  I  suppose,  when  the  four  winds  (your  only  pilots)  steer 
competitively  from  its  four  corners,  and  carry  it,  o>s  birwpivhs  Bope^s 
(popeTjaiy  aK&vQas,  and  then  more  than  your  feet  will  be  in  the  water. 

[*  "Not  with  water,  but  with  ruin."  The  worst  ruin  being  that 
which  the  Americans  chieily  boast  of.  They  sent  all  their  best  and 
honestest  youths,  Harvard  University  men  and  the  like,  to  that  accursed 
war  ;  got  them  nearly  all  shot  ;  wrote  pretty  biographies  (to  the  ages  of 
17,  18,  19)  and  epitaphs  for  them  ;  and  so,  having  washed  all  the  salt 
out  of  the  nation  in  blood,  left  themselves  to  putrefaction,  and  tha 
morality  of  New  York.] 

[f  This  paragraph  contains  the  gist  of  all  that  precede.] 


HUN  ERA  PULVERIS. 


195 


by  fools.  But  all  forms  of  government  are  good  just  so  far 
as  they  attain  this  one  vital  necessity  of  policy — that  the  wise 
and  kind,  few  or  many,  shall  govern  the  unwise  and  unkind  ;  and 
they  are  evil  so  far  as  they  miss  of  this,  or  reverse  it.  Nol 
does  the  form,  in  any  case,  signify  one  whit,  but  its  firmness, 
and  adaptation  to  the  need  ;  for  if  there  be  many  foolish  per- 
sons in  a  state,  and  few  wise,  then  it  is  good  that  the  few 
govern  ;  and  if  there  be  many  wise,  and  few  foolish,  then  it  is 
good  that  the  many  govern  ;  and  if  many  be  wise,  yet  one 
wiser,  then  it  is  good  that  one  should  govern  ;  and  so  on. 
Thus,  we  may  have  "  the  ant's  republic,  and  the  realm  of 
bees,"  both  good  in  their  kind  ;  one  for  groping,  and  the 
other  for  building  ;  and  nobler  still,  for  flying  ; — the  Ducal 
monarchy*  of  those 

Intelligent  of  seasons,  tliat  set  forth 
The  aery  caravan,  high  over  seas. 

128.  Nor  need  we  want  examples,  among  the  inferior  creat- 
ures, of  dissoluteness,  as  well  as  resoluteness,  in  government. 
I  once  saw  democracy  finely  illustrated  by  the  beetles  of 
North  Switzerland,  who  by  universal  suffrage,  and  elytric  ac- 
clamation, one  May  twilight,  carried  it,  that  they  would  fly 
over  the  Lake  of  Zug  ;  and  flew  short,  to  the  great  disfigure- 
ment of  the  Lake  of  Zug, — KavOdpov  \ifxrjv — over  some  leagues 
square,  and  to  the  close  of  the  cockchafer  democracy  for  that 
year.  Then,  for  tyranny,  the  old  fable  of  the  frogs  and  the 
stork  finely  touches  one  form  of  it ;  but  truth  will  image  it 
more  closely  than  fable,  for  tyranny  is  not  complete  when  it 
is  only  over  the  idle,  but  when  it  is  over  the  laborious  and 
the  blind.  This  description  of  pelicans  and  climbing  perch, 
which  I  find  quoted  in  one  of  our  popular  natural  histories, 
out  of  Sir  Emerson  Tennant's  Ceylon,  comes  as  near  as  may 
be  to  the  true  image  of  the  thing  : — 

[*  Whenever  you  are  puzzled  by  any  apparently  mistaken  use  of  words 
in  these  essays,  take  your  dictionary,  remembering  I  had  to  fix  terms,  as 
well  as  principles.  A  Duke  is  a  "  dux  "  or  "  leader  ;  "  the  flying  wedge 
of  cranes  is  under  a  "ducal  monarch" — a  very  different  personage 
from  a  queen  bee.  The  Venetians,  with  a  beautiful  instinct,  gave  th.8 
name  to  their  King  of  the  Sea.  ] 


196 


M  UN  Eli  A  PULYERIS. 


u  Heavy  rains  came  on,  and  as  we  stood  on  the  high 
ground,  we  observed  a  pelican  on  the  margin  of  the  shallow 
pool  gorging  himself ;  our  people  went  towards  him,  and 
raised  a  cry  of  '  Fish,  fish !  '  We  hurried  down,  and  found 
numbers  of  fish  struggling  upward  through  the  grass,  in  the 
rills  formed  by  the  trickling  of  the  rain.  There  was  scarcely 
water  to  cover  them,  but  nevertheless  they  made  rapid  prog- 
ress up  the  bank,  on  which  our  followers  collected  about 
two  baskets  of  them.  They  were  forcing  their  way  up  the 
knoll,  and  had  they  not  been  interrupted,  first  by  the  pelican, 
and  afterwards  by  ourselves,  they  would  in  a  few  minutes 
have  gained  the  highest  point,  and  descended  on  the  other 
side  into  a  pool  which  formed  another  portion  of  the  tank. 
In  going  this  distance,  however,  they  must  have  used  muscu- 
lar exertion  enough  to  have  taken  them  half  a  mile  on  level 
ground  ;  for  at  these  places  all  the  cattle  and  wild  animals  of 
the  neighbourhood  had  latterly  come  to  drink,  so  that  the 
surface  was  everywhere  indented  with  footmarks,  in  addition 
to  the  cracks  in  the  surrounding  baked  mud,  into  which  the 
fish  tumbled  in  their  progress.  In  those  holes,  which  were 
deep,  and  the  sides  perpendicular,  they  remained  to  die,  and 
were  carried  off  by  kites  and  crows."  * 

127.  But  whether  governments  be  bad  or  good,  one  gen- 
eral disadvantage  seems  to  attach  to  them  in  modern  times — 
that  they  are  all  costly,  f  This,  however,  is  not  essentially 
the  fault  of  the  governments.  If  nations  choose  to  play  at 
war,  they  will  always  find  their  governments  willing  to  leacl 
the  game,  and  soon  coming  under  that  term  of  Aristophanes, 
"  K&TrrjkoL  dc77raW,"  "  shield-sellers."  And  when  (tt%a'  £-1 
TrtjfxaTi  I)  the  shields  take  the  form  of  iron  ships,  with  ap- 

[*  This  is  a  perfect  picture  of  the  French  under  the  tyrannies  of  their 
Pelican  Kings,  before  the  Revolution.  But  they  must  find  other  than 
Pelican  Kings— or  rather,  Pelican  Kings  of  the  Divine  brood,  that  feed 
their  children,  and  with  their  best  blood. 

[f  Bead  carefully,  from  this  point ;  because  here  begins  the  statement 
of  things  requiring  to  be  done,  which  I  am  now  re-trying  to  make  defi* 
nite  in  Fors  Clavigera.] 

\X  "  Evil  on  the  top  of  Evil."  Delphic  oracle,  meaning  iron  on  tha 
anvil.] 


MUNERA  PULVERIS. 


197 


paratus  "  for  defence  against  liquid  fire," — as  I  see  by  latest 
accounts  they  are  now  arranging  the  decks  in  English 
dockyards — they  become  costly  biers  enough  for  the  grey 
convoy  of  chief  mourner  waves,  wreathed  with  funereal  foam, 
to  bear  back  the  dead  upon  ;  the  massy  shoulders  of  those 
corpse-bearers  being  intended  for  quite  other  work,  and  to 
bear  the  living,  and  food  for  the  living,  if  we  would  let  them. 

128.  Nor  have  we  the  least  right  to  complain  of  our  gov- 
ernments being  expensive,  so  long  as  we  set  the  government 
*o  do  'precisely  the  work  which  brings  no  return.  If  our  pres- 
ent doctrines  of  political  economy  be  just,  let  us  trust  them 
to  the  utmost ;  take  that  war  business  out  of  the  government's 
hands,  and  test  therein  the  principles  of  supply  and  demand. 
Let  our  future  sieges  of  Sebastopol  be  done  by  contract — no 
capture,  no  pay— (I  admit  that  things  might  sometimes  go 
better  so) ;  and  let  us  sell  the  commands  of  our  prospective 
battles,  with  our  vicarages,  to  the  lowest  bidder ;  so  may  we 
have  cheap  victories,  and  divinity.  On  the  other  hand,  if  Ave 
have  so  much  suspicion  of  our  science  that  we  dare  not  trust 
it  on  military  or  spiritual  business,  would  it  not  be  but  rea- 
sonable to  try  whether  some  authoritative  handling  may  not 
prosper  in  matters  utilitarian?  If  we  were  to  set  our  govern- 
ments to  do  useful  things  instead  of  mischievous,  possibly 
even  the  apparatus  itself  might  in  time  come  to  be  less  costly. 
The  machine,  applied  to  the  building  of  the  house,  might  per- 
haps  pay,  when  it  seems  not  to  pay,  applied  to  pulling  it 
down.  If  we  made  in  our  dockyards  ships  to  carry  timber 
and  coals,  instead  of  cannon,  and  with  provision  for  the 
brightening  of  domestic  solid  culinary  fire,  instead  of  for  the 
scattering  of  liquid  hostile  fire,  it  might  have  some  effect  on 
the  taxes.  Or  suppose  that  we  tried  the  experiment  on  land 
instead  of  water  carriage  ;  already  the  government,  not  unap- 
proved, carries  letters  and  parcels  for  us  ;  larger  packages 
may  in  time  follow  ; — even  general  merchandise — why  not,  at 
last,  ourselves  ?  Had  the  money  spent  in  local  mistakes  and 
vain  private  litigation,  on  the  railroads  of  England,  been  laid 
out,  instead,  under  proper  government  restraint,  on  really 
useful  railroad  work,  and  had  no  absurd  expense  been  in« 


198 


MUNEBA  PULVBRIS. 


curred  in  ornamenting  stations,  we  might  already  have  had,— 
what  ultimately  it  will  be  found  we  must  have, — quadruple 
rails,  two  for  passengers,  and  two  for  traffic,  on  every  great 
line  ;  and  we  might  have  been  carried  in  swift  safety,  and 
watched  and  warded  by  well-paid  pointsmen,  for  half  the 
present  fares.  [For,  of  course,  a  railroad  company  is  merely 
an  association  of  turnpike-keepers,  who  make  the  tolls  as  high 
as  they  can,  not  to  mend  the  roads  with,  but  to  pocket.  The 
public  will  in  time  discover  this,  and  do  away  with  turnpikes 
on  railroads,  as  on  all  other  public-ways.] 

129.  Suppose  it  should  thus  turn  out,  finally,  that  a  true 
government  set  to  true  work,  instead  of  being  a  costly  engine, 
was  a  paying  one  ?  that  your  government,  rightly  organized, 
instead  of  itself  subsisting  by  an  income-tax,  would  produce 
its  subjects  some  subsistence  in  the  shape  of  an  income  divi- 
dend?— police,  and  judges  duly  paid  besides,  only  with  less 
work  than  the  state  at  present  provides  for  them. 

A  true  government  set  to  true  work  ! — Not  easily  to  be 
imagined,  still  less  obtained  ;  but  not  beyond  human  hope  or 
ingenuity.  Only  you  will  have  to  alter  your  election  systems 
somewhat,  first.  Not  by  universal  suffrage,  nor  by  votes  pur- 
chasable with  beer,  is  such  government  to  be  had.  That  is* 
to  say,  not  by  universal  equal  suffrage.  Every  man  upwards 
of  twenty,  who  has  been  convicted  of  no  legal  crime,  should 
have  his  say  in  this  matter  ;  but  afterwards  a  louder  voice, 
as  he  grows  older,  and  approves  himself  wiser.  If  he  has  one 
vote  at  twenty,  he  should  have  two  at  thirty,  four  at  forty,  ten 
at  fifty.  For  every  single  vote  which  he  has  with  an  income 
of  a  hundred  a  year,  he  should  have  ten  with  an  income  of  a 
thousand,  (provided  you  first  see  to  it  that  wealth  is,  as  nature 
intended  it  to  be,  the  reward  of  sagacity  and  industry — not 
of  good  luck  in  a  scramble  or  a  lottery).  For  every  single 
vote  which  he  had  as  subordinate  in  any  business,  he  should 
have  two  when  he  became  a  master  ;  and  every  office  and 
authority  nationally  bestowed,  implying  trustworthiness  and 
intellect,  should  have  its  known  proportional  number  of  votes 
attached  to  it.  But  into  the  detail  and  working  of  a  true 
system  in  these  matters  we  cannot  now  enter ;  we  are  con- 


MTJNEBA  PULVERIS. 


199 


cenied  as  yet  with  definitions  only,  and  statements  of  first 
principles,  which  will  be  established  now  sufficiently  for  our 
purposes  when  we  have  examined  the  nature  of  that  form  of 
government  last  on  the  list  in  §  105, — the  purely  "  Magistral," 
exciting  at  present  its  full  share  of  public  notice,  under  its 
ambiguous  title  of  "slavery." 

130.  I  have  not,  however,  been  able  to  ascertain  in  definite 
terms,  from  the  declaimers  against  slavery,  what  they  under- 
stand by  it.  If  they  mean  only  the  imprisonment  or  compul- 
sion of  one  person  by  another,  such  imprisonment  or  compul- 
sion being  in  many  cases  highly  expedient,  slavery,  so  defined, 
would  be  no  evil  in  itself,  but  only  in  its  abuse  ;  that  is,  when 
men  are  slaves,  who  should  not  be,  or  masters,  who  should 
not  be,  or  even  the  fittest  characters  for  either  state,  placed 
in  it  under  conditions  which  should  not  be.  It  is  not,  for 
instance,  a  necessary  condition  of  slavery,  nor  a  desirable  one, 
that  parents  should  be  separated  from  children,  or  husbands 
from  wives  ;  but  the  institution  of  war,  against  which  people 
declaim  with  less  violence,  effects  such  separations, — not  un- 
frequently  in  a  very  permanent  manner.  To  press  a  sailor, 
seize  a  white  youth  by  conscription  for  a  soldier,  or  carry  off 
a  black  one  for  a  labourer,  may  all  be  right  acts,  or  all  wrong 
ones,  according  to  needs  and  circumstances.  It  is  wrong  to 
scourge  a  man  unnecessarily.  So  it  is  to  shoot  him.  Both 
must  be  done  on  occasion  ;  and  it  is  better  and  kinder  to  flog 
a  man  to  his  work,  than  to  leave  him  idle  till  he  robs,  and 
flog  him  afterwards.  The  essential  thing  for  all  creatures  is 
to  be  made  to  do  right ;  how  they  are  made  to  do  it — by 
pleasant  promises,  or  hard  necessities,  pathetic  oratory,  or 
the  whip — is  comparatively  immaterial.*  To  be  deceived  is 
perhaps  as  incompatible  with  human  dignity  as  to  be  whipped  ; 
and  I  suspect  the  last  method  to  be  not  the  worst,  for  the 
help  of  many  individuals.  The  Jewish  nation  throve  under 
it,  in  the  hand  of  a  monarch  reputed  not  unwise  ;  it  is  only 
the  change  of  whip  for  scorpion  which  is  inexpedient ;  and 

[*  Permit  me  to  enfore  and  reinforce  this  statement,  with  all  earnest- 
ness. It  is  the  sum  of  what  needs  most  to  be  understood  in  the  matte* 
of  education  ] 


200 


MUNEEA  PULVERIS. 


that  change  is  as  likely  to  come  to  pass  on  the  side  of  license 
as  of  law.  For  the  true  scorpion  whips  are  those  of  the  na- 
tion's pleasant  vices,  which  are  to  it  as  St.  John's  locusts — 
crown  on  the  head,  ravin  in  the  mouth,  and  sting  in  the  tail. 
If  it  will  not  bear  the  rule  of  Athena  and  Apollo,  who  shep- 
herd without  smiting  (ov  rrXvyrj  i/e/wrcs),  Athena  at  last  calls 
no  more  in  the  corners  of  the  streets ;  and  then  follows  the 
rule  of  Tisiphone,  who  smites  without  shepherding. 

131.  If,  however,  by  slavery,  instead  of  absolute  compul- 
sion, is  meant  the  purch  ase,  by  m  oney,  of  the  right  of  compulsion, 
such  purchase  is  necessarily  made  whenever  a  portion  of  any 
territory  is  transferred,  for  money,  from  one  monarch  to 
another :  which  has  happened  frequently  enough  in  history, 
without  its  being  supposed  that  the  inhabitants  of  the  dis- 
tricts so  transferred  became  therefore  slaves.  In  this,  as  in 
the  former  case,  the  dispute  seems  about  the  fashion  of  the 
thing,  rather  than  the  fact  of  it.  There  are  two  rocks  in 
mid-sea,  on  each  of  which,  neglected  equally  by  instructive 
and  commercial  powers,  a  handful  of  inhabitants  live  as  they 
may.  Two  merchants  bid  for  the  two  properties,  but  not  in 
the  same  terms.  One  bids  for  the  people,  buys  them,  and 
sets  them  to  work,  under  pain  of  scourge  ;  the  other  bids  for 
the  rock,  buys  it,  and  throws  the  inhabitants  into  the  sea. 
The  former  is  the  American,  the  latter  the  English  method, 
of  slavery  ;  much  is  to  be  said  for,  and  something  against, 
both,  which  I  hope  to  say  in  due  time  and  place.* 

132.  If,  however,  slavery  mean  not  merely  the  purchase  of 
the  right  of  compulsion,  but  the  purchase  of  the  body  and  soul  of 
the  creature  itself  for  money,  it  is  not,  I  think,  among  the  black 
races  that  purchases  of  this  kind  are  most  extensively  made, 
or  that  separate  souls  of  a  fine  make  fetch  the  highest  price. 
This  branch  of  the  inquiry  w7e  shall  have  occasion  also  to  fol- 
low out  at  some  length,  for  in  the  worst  instances  of  the  sell- 
ing of  souls,  we  are  apt  to  get,  when  we  ask  if  the  sale  is  valid, 
only  Pyrrhon's  answer  t — "  None  can  know." 

[*  A  pregnant  paragraph,  meant  against  English  and  Scotch  land* 
lords  who  drive  their  people  off  the  land.] 
[f  In  Lucian's  dialogue,  "  The  sale  of  lives."] 


M  UN  ERA  PULVER1S. 


201 


133.  The  fact  is  that  slavery  is  not  a  political  institution  at 
all,  but  an  inherent,  natural,  and  eternal  inheritance  of  a  large 
portion  of  the  human  race — to  whom,  the  more  you  give  of 
their  own  free  will,  the  more  slaves  they  will  make  themselves. 
In  common  parlance,  we  idly  confuse  captivity  with  slavery,  and 
are  always  thinking  of  the  difference  between  pine-trunks  (Ariel 
in  the  pine),  and  cowslip-bells  ("  in  the  cowslip-bell  I  lie  "),  or 
between  carrying  wood  and  drinking  (Caliban's  slavery  and 
freedom),  instead  of  noting  the  far  more  serious  differences  be- 
tween Ariel  and  Caliban  themselves,  and  the  means  by  which, 
practically,  that  difference  may  be  brought  about  or  diminished, 

134.  *  Plato's  slave,  in  the  Polity,  who,  well  dressed  and 
washed,  aspires  to  the  hand  of  his  master's  daughter,  corre- 
sponds curiously  to  Caliban  attacking  Prospero's  cell ;  and 
there  is  an  undercurrent  of  meaning  throughout,  in  the  Tern- 
vest  as  well  as  in  the  Merchant  of  Venice  ;  referring  in  this  case 
to  government,  as  in  that  to  commerce.  Miranda  f  ("  the 
wonderful,"  so  addressed  first  by  Ferdinand,  "  Oh,  you  won- 
der !  ")  corresponds  to  Homer's  Arete  :  Ariel  and  Caliban  are 

[*  I  raise  tliis  analysis  of  the  Tempest  into  my  text  ;  but  it  is  nothing 
but  a  hurried  note,  which  I  may  never  have  time  to  expand.  I  have 
retouched  it  here  and  there  a  little,  however.] 

f  Of  Shakspeare's  names  I  will  afterwards  speak  at  more  length  ; 
they  are  curiously — often  barbarously — much  by  Providence, — but  as- 
suredly not  without  Shakspeare's  cunning  purpose — mixed  out  of  the 
various  traditions  he  confusedly  adopted,  and  languages  which  he  im- 
perfectly knew.  Three  of  the  clearest  in  meaning  have  been  already 
noticed.  Desdemona,  "  §v<jda.ifxovia"  "  miserable  fortune,"  is  also  plain 
enough.  Othello  is,  I  believe,  "the  careful  ;  "  all  the  calamity  of  the 
tragedy  arising  from  the  single  flaw  and  error  in  his  magnificently  col- 
lected strength.  Ophelia,  "  serviceableness,"  the  true  lost  wife  of 
Hamlet,  is  marked  as  having  a  Greek  name  by  that  of  her  brother, 
Laertes ;  and  its  signification  is  once  exquisitely  alluded  to  in  that 
brother's  last  word  of  her,  where  her  gentle  preciousness  is  opposed  to 
the  uselessness  of  the  churlish  clergy — "  A  ministering  angel  shall  my 
Bister  be,  when  thou  liest  howling."  Hamlet  is,  I  believe,  connected  in 
some  way  with  "homely"  the  entire  event  of  the  tragedy  turning  on 
betrayal  of  home  duty.  Hermione  (e'^ua),  "pillar-like,"  (r/  eTSos 
IGpWrfS  'AQpoSiTrjs).  Titania  (rir-fivrj),  "the  queen;"  Benedict  and 
Beatrice,  "blessed  and  blessing;"  Valentine  and  Proteus,  enduring 
(or  strong),  (valens\  and  changeful.    Iago  and  Iachimo  have  evidently 


202 


MUX  ERA  PU  LYE  J  US. 


respectively  the  spirits  of  faithful  and  imaginative  labour, 
opposed  to  rebellious,  hurtful  and  slavish  labour.  Prospero 
("for  hope  "),  a  true  governor,  is  opposed  to  Sycorax,  the 
mother  of  slavery,  her  name  "  Swine-raven/'  indicating  at  once 
brutality  and  deathfulness  ;  hence  the  line — 
"  As  wicked  dew  as  e'er  niy  mother  brushed,  with  raven's  featlier" — &c. 
For  all  these  dreams  of  Shakespeare,  as  those  of  true  and 

strong  men  must  be,  are  u  (jxivTacrjjLara  #eia?  kol  ckiol  twv  qv- 
tusP™ — divine  phantasms,  and  shadows  of  things  that  are.  We 
hardly  tell  our  children,  willingly,  a  fable  with  no  purport  in 
it ;  yet  we  think  God  sends  his  best  messengers  only  to  sing 
fairy  tales  to  us,  fond  and  empty.  The  Tempest  is  just  like  a 
grotesque  in  a  rich  missal,  "  clasped  where  paynims  pray." 
Ariel  is  the  spirit  of  generous  and  free-hearted  service,  in  early 
stages  of  human  society  oppressed  by  ignorance  and  wild  tyr- 
anny :  venting  groans  as  fast  as  mill-wheels  strike  ;  in  ship- 
wreck of  states,  dreadful ;  so  that  "  all  but  mariners  plunge  in 
the  brine,  and  quit  the  vessel,  then  all  afire  with  me,*9  yet  hav- 
ing in  itself  the  will  and  sweetness  of  truest  peace,  whence 
that  is  especially  called  "Ariel's"  song,  "Come  unto  these 
yellow  sands,  and  there,  take  hands"  "courtesied  when  you 
have,  and  kissed,  the  wild  waves  whist:"  (mind,  it  is  "cor- 
tesia,"  not  "  curtsey,")  and  read  "  quiet  "  for  "  whist,"  if  you 
want  the  full  sense.  Then  you  may  indeed  foot  it  featly,  and 
kweet  spirits  bear  the  burden  for  you — with  watch  in  the 
night,  and  call  in  early  morning.  The  vis  viva  in  elemental 
transformation  follows — "  Full  fathom  five  thy  father  lies,  of 
his  bones  are  coral  made."  Then,  giving  rest  after  labour,  it 
"fetches  dew  from  the  still  vext  Bermoothes,  and,  with  a 
charm  joined  to  their  suffered  labour,  leaves  men  asleep." 
Snatching  away  the  feast  of  the  cruel,  it  seems  to  them  as  a 
harpy  ;  followed  by  the  utterly  vile,  who  cannot  see  it  in  any 
shape,  but  to  whom  it  is  the  picture  of  nobody,  it  still  gives 
shrill  harmony  to  their  false  and  mocking  catch,  "  Thought  is 

the  same  root— probably  the  Spanish  lago,  Jacob,  "the  supplanter," 
Leonatus,  and  other  such  names,  are  interpreted,  or  played  with,  in  the 
plays  themselves.  For  the  interpretation  of  Sycorax,  and  reference  to 
her  raven's  feather,  I  am  indebted  to  Mr.  John  R.  Wise. 


MUNERA  PULVERIS. 


free  ; "  but  leads  them  into  briers  and  foul  places,  and  at  last 
hollas  the  hounds  upon  them.  Minister  of  fate  against  the 
great  criminal,  it  joins  itself  with  the  "incensed  seas  and 
shores  " — the  sword  that  layeth  at  it  cannot  hold,  and  may 
"  with  bemocked-at  stabs  as  soon  kill  the  still-closing  waters, 
as  diminish  one  dowle  that  is  in  its  plume."  As  the  guide  and 
aid  of  true  love,  it  is  always  called  by  Prospero  "fine  "  (the 
French  "  fine,"  not  the  English),  or  "  delicate  " — another  long 
note  would  be  needed  to  explain  all  the  meaning  in  this  word. 
Lastly,  its  work  done,  and  war,  it  resolves  itself  into  the  ele- 
ments. The  intense  significance  of  the  last  song,  "Where 
the  bee  sucks,"  I  will  examine  in  its  due  place. 

The  types  of  slavery  in  Caliban  are  more  palpable,  and  need 
not  be  dwelt  on  now  :  though  I  will  notice  them  also,  sever- 
ally, in  their  proper  places  ; — the  heart  of  his  slavery  is  in  his 
worship  :  "  That's  a  brave  god,  and  bears  celestial — liquor." 
But,  in  illustration  of  the  sense  in  which  the  Latin  "  benig- 
nus  "  and  "  malignus  "  are  to  be  coupled  with  Eleutheria  and 
Douleia,  note  that  Caliban's  torment  is  always  the  physical  re- 
flection of  his  own  nature  —  "  cramps  "  and  "  side  stiches 
that  shall  pen  thy  breath  up  ;  thou  shalt  be  pinched,  as  thick 
as  honeycombs  : "  the  whole  nature  of  slavery  being  one 
cramp  and  cretinous  contraction.  Fancy  this  of  Ariel !  You 
may  fetter  him,  but  you  set  no  mark  on  him  ;  you  may  put  him 
to  hard  work  and  far  journey,  but  you  cannot  give  him  a  cramp. 

135.  I  should  dwell,  even  in  these  prefatory  papers,  at  more 
length  on  this  subject  of  slavery,  had  not  all  I  would  say  been 
said  already,  in  vain,  (not,  as  I  hope,  ultimately  in  vain),  by 
Carlyle,  in  the  first  of  the  Latter-day  Pamphlets,  which  I  com- 
mend to  the  reader's  gravest  reading  ;  together  with  that  as 
much  neglected,  and  still  more  immediately  needed,  on  model 
prisons,  and  with  the  great  chapter  on  "  Permanence  "  (fifth 
of  the  last  section  of  "  Past  and  Present  "),  which  sums  what 
is  known,  and  foreshadows,  or  rather  forelights,  all  that  is  to 
be  learned  of  National  Discipline.  I  have  only  here  farther  to 
examine  the  nature  of  one  world-wide  and  everlasting  form  of 
slavery,  wholesome  in  use,  as  deadly  in  abuse  ;— the  service  of 
the  rich  by  the  poor. 


204 


M  UN  ERA  PULVEBJR 


CHAPTER  VL 

MASTERSHIP. 

136.  As  in  all  previous  discussions  of  our  subject,  we  must 
study  the  relation  of  the  commanding  rich  to  the  obeying 
poor  in  its  simplest  elements,  in  order  to  reach  its  first  prin- 
ciples. 

The  simplest  state  of  it,  then,  is  this :  *  a  wise  and  provi- 
dent person  works  much,  consumes  little,  and  lays  by  a  store  ; 
an  improvident  person  works  little,  consumes  all  his  produce, 
and  lays  by  no  store.  Accident  interrupts  the  daily  work,  or 
renders  it  less  productive  ;  the  idle  person  must  then  starve, 
or  be  supported  by  the  provident  one,  who,  having  him  thus 
at  his  mercy,  may  either  refuse  to  maintain  him  altogether, 
or,  which  will  evidently  be  more  to  his  own  interest,  say  to 
him,  "  I  will  maintain  you,  indeed,  but  you  shall  now  work 
hard,  instead  of  indolently,  and  instead  of  being  allowed  to 
lay  by  what  you  save,  as  you  might  have  done,  had  you  re- 
mained independent,  J  will  take  all  the  surplus.  You  would 
not  lay  it  up  for  yourself ;  it  is  wholly  your  own  fault  that 
has  thrown  you  into  my  power,  and  I  will  force  you  to  work, 
or  starve  ;  yet  you  shall  have  no  profit  of  your  work,  only 
your  daily  bread  for  it ;  [and  competition  shall  determine 
how  much  of  thatf]."    This  mode  of  treatment  has  now  be- 

*  In  the  present  general  examination,  I  concede  so  much  to  ordinary- 
economists  as  to  ignore  all  innocent  poverty.  I  adapt  my  reasoning,  for 
once,  to  the  modern  English  practical  mind,  by  assuming  poverty  to  be 
always  criminal;  the  conceivable  exceptions  we  will  examine  after- 
wards. 

[f  I  have  no  terms  of  English,  and  can  find  none  in  Greek  nor  Latin, 
nor  in  any  other  strong  language  known  to  me,  contemptuous  enough  to 
attach  to  the  bestial  idiotism  of  the  modern  theory  that  wages  are  to  be 
measured  by  competition  J 


M  UN  ERA  PULVERIS. 


205 


come  so  universal  that  it  is  supposed  to  be  the  only  natural — > 
nay,  the  only  possible  one  ;  and  the  market  wages  are  calmly 
defined  by  economists  as  "  th©  sum  which  will  maintain  the 
labourer." 

137.  The  power  of  the  provident  person  to  do  this  is  only 
checked  by  the  correlative  power  of  some  neighbour  of  simi- 
larly frugal  habits,  who  says  to  the  labourer — "  I  will  give  you 
a  little  more  than  this  other  provident  person  :  come  and  work 
for  me." 

The  power  of  the  provident  over  the  improvident  depends 
thus,  primarily,  on  their  relative  numbers  ;  secondarily,  on  the 
modes  of  agreement  of  the  adverse  parties  with  each  other. 
The  accidental  level  of  wages  is  a  variable  function  of  the  num- 
ber of  provident  and  idle  persons  in  the  world,  of  the  enmity 
between  them  as  classes,  and  of  the  agreement  between  those 
of  the  same  class.  It  depends,  from  beginning  to  end,  on  moral 
conditions. 

138.  Supposing  the  rich  to  be  entirely  selfish,  it  is  always 
for  their  interest  that  the  poor  should  be  as  numerous  as  they  can 
employ,  and  restrain.  For,  granting  that  the  entire  population 
is  no  larger  than  the  ground  can  easily  maintain — that  the 
classes  are  stringently  divided — and  that  there  is  sense  or 
strength  of  hand  enough  with  the  rich  to  secure  obedience  ; 
then,  if  nine-tenths  of  a  nation  are  poor,  the  remaining  tenth 
have  the  service  of  nine  persons  each  ;  *  but,  if  eight-tenths 
are  poor,  only  of  four  each ;  if  seven-tenths  are  poor,  of  two 
and  a  third  each  ;  if  six-tenths  are  poor,  of  one  and  a  half 
each  ;  and  if  five-tenths  are  poor,  of  only  one  each.  But,  prac* 
tically,  if  the  rich  strive  always  to  obtain  more  power  over  the 
poor,  instead  of  to  raise  them — and  if,  on  the  other  hand,  the 
poor  become  continually  more  vicious  and  numerous,  through 
neglect  and  oppression, — though  the  range  of  the  power  of 

*  I  say  nothing  yet  of  the  quality  of  the  servants,  which,  neverthe- 
less, is  the  gist  of  the  business.  Will  you  have  Paul  Veronese  to  paint 
your  ceiling,  or  the  plumber  from  over  the  way  ?  Both  will  work  for 
the  same  money  ;  Paul,  if  anything,  a  little  the  cheaper  of  the  two,  if 
you  keep  him  in  good  humour  ;  only  you  have  to  discern  him  first,  whicb 
will  need  eyes. 


206 


MUNEliA  PULVERIS. 


the  rich  increases,  its  tenure  becomes  less  secure  ;  until,  at  last, 
the  measure  of  iniquity  being  full,  revolution,  civil  war,  or  the 
subjection  of  the  state  to  a  healthier  or  stronger  one,  closea 
the  moral  corruption,  and  industrial  disease.* 

139.  It  is  rarely,  however,  that  things  come  to  this  extrem- 
ity. Kind  persons  among  the  rich,  and  wise  among  the  poor, 
modify  the  connexion  of  the  classes  :  the  efforts  made  to  raise 
and  relieve  on  the  one  side,  and  the  success  of  honest  toil  on 
the  other,  bind  and  blend  the  orders  of  society  into  the  con- 
fused  tissue  of  half-felt  obligation,  sullenly-rendered  obedi- 
ence, and  variously-directed,  or  mis-directed  toil,  which  form 
the  warp  of  daily  life.  But  this  great  law  rules  all  the  wild 
design  :  that  success  (while  society  is  guided  by  laws  of  com- 
petition) signifies  always  so  much  victory  over  your  neighbour  as 
to  obtain  the  direction  of  his  work,  and  to  take  the  profits  of 
it.  This  is  the  real  source  of  all  great  riches.  No  man  can 
become  largely  rich  by  his  personal  toil.f  The  work  of  his 
own  hands,  wisely  directed,  will  indeed  always  maintain  him- 
self and  his  family,  and  make  fitting  provision  for  his  aga 
But  it  is  only  by  the  discovery  of  some  method  of  taxing  the  la- 
bour of  others  that  he  can  become  opulent.  Every  increase  of 
his  capital  enables  him  to  extend  this  taxation  more  widely  ; 
that  is,  to  invest  larger  funds  in  the  maintenance  of  labourers, 
— to  direct,  accordingly,  vaster  and  yet  vaster  masses  of  la- 
bour, and  to  appropriate  its  profits. 

140.  There  is  much  confusion  of  idea  on  the  subject  of  this 
appropriation.  It  is,  of  course,  the  interest  of  the  employer 
to  disguise  it  from  the  persons  employed  ;  and,  for  his  own 
comfort  and  complaeencj',  he  often  desires  no  less  to  disguise 
it  from  himself.  And  it  is  matter  of  much  doubt  with  me, 
how  far  the  foul  and  foolish  arguments  used  habitually  on 
this  subject  are  indeed  the  honest  expression  of  foul  and  fool- 

[*  I  have  not  altered  a  syllable  in  these  three  paragraphs,  137,  188, 
139,  on  revision  ;  but  have  much  italicised  :  the  principles  stated  being 
as  vital,  as  they  are  little  known.] 

f  By  his  art  he  may  ;  but  only  when  its  produce,  or  the  sight  or  hear- 
ing of  it,  becomes  a  subject  of  dispute,  so  as  to  enable  the  artist  to  ta# 
the  labour  of  multitudes  highly,  in  exchange  for  his  own. 


HUN  ERA  PULVK1US. 


207 


ish  convictions  ; — or  rather  (as  I  am  sometimes  forced  to  con- 
clude from  the  irritation  with  which  they  are  advanced)  are 
resolutely  dishonest,  wilful,  and  malicious  sophisms,  arranged 
so  as  to  mask,  to  the  last  moment,  the  real  laws  of  economy, 
and  future  duties  of  men.  By  taking  a  simple  example,  and 
working  it  thoroughly  out,  the  subject  may  be  rescued  from 
all  but  such  determined  misrepresentation. 

141.  Let  us  imagine  a  society  of  peasants,  living  on  a  river- 
shore,  exposed  to  destructive  inundation  at  somewhat  extended 
intervals  ;  and  that  each  peasant  possesses  of  this  good,  but 
imperilled,  ground,  more  than  he  needs  to  cultivate  for  im- 
mediate subsistence.  We  will  assume  farther  (and  with  too 
great  probability  of  justice),  that  the  greater  part  of  them  in- 
dolently keep  in  tillage  just  as  much  land  as  supplies  them 
with  daily  food  ; — that  they  leave  their  children  idle,  and  take 
no  precautions  against  the  rise  of  the  stream.  But  one  of 
them,  (we  will  say  but  one,  for  the  sake  of  greater  clearness) 
cultivates  carefully  all  the  ground  of  his  estate  ;  makes  his 
children  work  hard  and  healthily  ;  uses  his  spare  time  and 
theirs  in  building  a  rampart  against  the  river  ;  and,  at  the 
end  of  some  years,  has  in  his  storehouses  large  reserves  of  food 
and  clothing, — in  his  stables  a  well-tended  breed  of  cattle, 
and  around  his  fields  a  wedge  of  wall  against  flood. 

The  torrent  rises  at  last — sweeps  away  the  harvests,  and 
half  the  cottages  of  the  careless  peasants,  and  leaves  them 
destitute.  They  naturally  come  for  help  to  the  provident  one, 
whose  fields  are  unwasted,  and  whose  granaries  are  full.  Ke 
has  the  right  to  refuse  it  to  them  :  no  one  disputes  this  right.* 
But  he  will  probably  not  refuse  it ;  it  is  not  his  interest  to  do 
so,  even  were  he  entirely  selfish  and  cruel.  The  only  ques- 
tion  with  him  will  be  on  what  terms  his  aid  is  to  be  granted. 

142.  Clearly,  not  on  terms  of  mere  charity.  To  maintain 
his  neighbours  in  idleness  would  be  not  only  his  ruin,  but 
theirs.  He  will  require  work  from  them,  in  exchange  for 
their  maintenance  ;  and,  whether  in  kindness  or  cruelty,  all 

[*  Observe  this  ;  the  legal  right  to  keep  what  you  have  worked  for, 
and  use  it  as  you  please,  is  the  corner-stone  of  all  economy  :  compare 
the  end  of  Chap,  II.] 


208 


MUNERA  PULVERIS. 


the  work  they  can  give.  Not  now  the  three  or  four  hours 
they  were  wont  to  spend  on  their  own  land,  but  the  eight  or 
ten  hours  they  ought  to  have  spent.*  But  how  will  he  apply 
this  labour  ?  The  men  are  now  his  slaves  ; — nothing  less,  and 
nothing  more.  On  pain  of  starvation,  he  can  force  them  to 
work  in  the  manner,  and  to  the  end,  he  chooses.  And  it  is 
by  his  wisdom  in  this  choice  that  the  worthiness  of  his  mas- 
tership is  proved,  or  its  unworthiness.  Evidently,  he  must 
first  set  them  to  bank  out  the  water  in  some  temporary  way, 
and  to  get  their  ground  cleansed  and  resown  ;  else,  in  any 
case,  their  continued  maintenance  will  be  impossible.  That 
done,  and  while  he  has  still  to  feed  them,  suppose  he  makes 
them  raise  a  secure  rampart  for  their  own  ground  against  all 
future  flood,  and  rebuild  their  houses  in  safer  places,  with  the 
best  material  they  can  find  ;  being  allowed  time  out  of  their 
working  hours  to  fetch  such  material  from  a  distance.  And 
for  the  food  and  clothing  advanced,  he  takes  security  in  land 
that  as  much  shall  be  returned  at  a  convenient  period. 

143.  We  may  conceive  this  security  to  be  redeemed,  and 
the  debt  paid  at  the  end  of  a  few  years.  The  prudent  peas- 
ant has  sustained  no  loss  ;  but  is  no  richer  than  he  was,  and 
has  had  all  his  trouble  for  nothing.  But  he  has  enriched  his 
neighbours  materially  ;  bettered  their  houses,  secured  their 
land,  and  rendered  them,  in  worldly  matters,  equal  to  him- 
self. In  all  rational  and  final  sense,  he  has  been  throughout 
their  true  Lord  and  King. 

144.  We  wdll  next  trace  his  probable  line  of  conduct,  pre- 
suming his  object  to  be  exclusively  the  increase  of  his  own 
fortune.  After  roughly  recovering  and  cleansing  the  ground, 
he  allows  the  ruined  peasantry  only  to  build  huts  upon  it, 
such  as  he  thinks  protective  enough  from  the  weather  to 
keep  them  in  working  health.  The  rest  of  their  time  he  oc- 
cupies, first  in  pulling  down,  and  rebuilding  on  a  magnificent 
scale,  his  own  house,  and  in  adding  large  dependencies  to  it. 
This  done,  in  exchange  for  his  continued  supply  of  corn,  he 

[*  I  should  now  put  the  time  of  necessary  labour  rather  under  than 
over  the  third  of  the  day.  ] 


MUNERA  PULVERIS. 


buys  as  much  of  his  neighbours'  land  as  he  thinks  he  can 
superintend  the  management  of;  and  makes  the  former 
owners  securely  embank  and  protect  the  ceded  portion.  By 
this  arrangement,  he  leaves  to  a  certain  number  of  the  peas- 
antry only  as  much  ground  as  will  just  maintain  them  in  their 
existing  numbers  ;  as  the  population  increases,  he  takes  the 
extra  hands,  who  cannot  be  maintained  on  the  narrowed  es- 
tates, for  his  own  servants  ;  employs  some  to  cultivate  the 
ground  he  has  bought,  giving  them  of  its  produce  merely 
enough  for  subsistence  ;  with  the  surplus,  which,  under  his 
energetic  and  careful  sirperintendence,  wTill  be  large,  he  main- 
tains a  train  of  servants  for  state,  and  a  body  of  workmenP 
whom  he  educates  in  ornamental  arts.  He  now  can  splen- 
didly decorate  his  house,  lay  out  its  grounds  magnificently, 
and  richly  supply  his  table,  and  that  of  his  household  and  ret- 
inue. And  thus,  without  any  abuse  of  right,  we  should  find 
established  all  the  phenomena  of  poverty  and  riches,  which 
(it  is  supposed  necessarily)  accompany  modern  civilization.  In 
one  part  of  the  district,  we  should  have  unhealthy  land,  mis- 
erable dwellings,  and  half-starved  poor  ;  in  another,  a  well- 
ordered  estate,  well-fed  servants,  and  refined  conditions  of 
highly  educated  and  luxurious  life. 

145.  I  have  put  the  two  cases  in  simplicity,  and  to  some 
extremity.  But  though  in  more  complex  and  qualified  opera- 
tion, all  the  relations  of  society  are  but  the  expansion  of  these 
two  typical  sequences  of  conduct  and  result.  I  do  not  say, 
observe,  that  the  first  procedure  is  entirely  recommendable  ; 
or  even  entirely  right ;  still  less,  that  the  second  is  wiioily 
wrong.  Servants,  and  artists,  and  splendour  of  habitation 
and  retinue,  have  all  their  use,  propriety,  and  office.  But  I 
am  determined  that  the  reader  shall  understand  clearly  what 
they  cost ;  and  see  that  the  condition  of  having  them  is  the 
subjection  to  us  of  a  certain  number  of  imprudent  or  unfort- 
unate persons  (or,  it  may  be,  more  fortunate  than  their  mas- 
ters), over  whose  destinies  we  exercise  a  boundless  control. 
"  Riches "  mean  eternally  and  essentially  this ;  and  God 
send  at  last  a  time  when  those  words  of  our  best-reputed 
economist  shall  be  true,  and  we  shall  indeed  "  all  know  what 


210 


MTJNERA  PULVEPJS. 


it  is  to  bo  rich  ; "  *  that  it  is  to  be  slave-m aster  over  farthest 
earth,  and  over  all  ways  and  thoughts  of  men.  Every  opera- 
tive you  employ  is  your  true  servant :  distant  or  near,  sub- 
ject to  your  immediate  orders,  or  ministering  to  your  widely- 
communicated  caprice, — for  the  pay  he  stipulates,  or  the  price 
lie  tempts, — all  are  alike  under  this  great  dominion  of  the 
gold.  The  milliner  who  makes  the  dress  is  as  much  a  ser- 
vant (more  so,  in  that  she  uses  more  intelligence  in  the  ser- 
vice) as  the  maid  who  puts  it  on  ;  the  carpenter  who  smooths 
the  door,  as  the  footman  who  opens  it  ;  the  tradesmen  who 
supply  the  table,  as  the  labourers  and  sailors  who  supply  the 
tradesmen.  Why  speak  of  these  lower  services?  Painters 
and  singers  (whether  of  note  or  rhyme,)  jesters  and  story- 
tellers, moralists,  historians,  priests, — so  far  as  these,  in  any 
degree,  paint,  or  sing,  or  tell  their  tale,  or  charm  their  charm, 
or  "perform"  their  rite,  for  pay, — in  so  far,  they  are  all 
slaves  ;  abject  utterly,  if  the  service  be  for  pay  only  ;  abject 
less  and  less  in  proportion  to  the  degrees  of  love  and  of  wis- 
dom which  enter  into  their  duty,  or  can  enter  into  it,  accord- 
ing as  their  function  is  to  do  the  bidding  and  the  work  of  a 
manly  people  ; — or  to  amuse,  tempt,  and  deceive,  a  childish 
one. 

146.  There  is  always,  in  such  amusement  and  temptation, 
to  a  certain  extent,  a  government  of  the  rich  by  the  poor,  as 
of  the  poor  by  the  rich  ;  but  the  latter  is  the  prevailing  and 
necessary  one,  and  it  consists,  when  it  is  honourable,  in  the 
collection  of  the  profits  of  labour  from  those  who  would  have 
misused  them,  and  the  administration  of  those  profits  for  the 
service  either  of  the  same  persons  in  future,  or  of  others  ;  and 
when  it  is  dishonourable,  as  is  more  frequently  the  case  in 
modern  times,  it  consists  in  the  collection  of  the  profits  of 
kbour  from  those  who  would  have  rightly  used  them,  and 
their  appropriation  to  the  service  of  the  collector  himself. 

147.  The  examination  of  these  various  modes  of  collection 
and  use  of  riches  will  form  the  third  branch  of  our  future  in- 
quiries ;  but  the  key  to  the  whole  subject  lies  in  the  clear  un- 
rierstanding  of  the  difference  between  selfish  and  unselfish 

[*  See  Preface  to  Unto  this  Last.] 


MUNEEA  PULVERIS. 


211 


expenditure.  It  is  not  easy,  by  any  course  of  reasoning,  to 
enforce  this  on  the  generally  unwilling  hearer  ;  yet  the  defini- 
tion of  unselfish  expenditure  is  brief  and  simple.  It  is  ex- 
penditure which,  if  you  are  a  capitalist,  does  not  pay  you,  but 
pays  somebody  else  ;  and  if  you  are  a  consumer,  does  not 
please  you,  but  pleases  somebody  else.  Take  one  special  in- 
stance, in  further  illustration  of  the  general  type  given  above. 
I  did  not  invent  that  type,  but  spoke  of  a  real  river,  and  of 
real  peasantry,  the  languid  and  sickly  race  which  inhabits,  or 
haunts — for  they  are  often  more  like  spectres  than  living  men 
— the  thorny  desolation  of  the  banks  of  the  Arve  in  Savoy. 
Some  years  ago,  a  society,  formed  at  Geneva,  offered  to  em- 
bank the  river  for  the  ground  which  would  have  been  re- 
covered by  the  operation  ;  but  the  offer  was  refused  by  the 
(then  Sardinian)  government.  The  capitalists  saw  that  this  ex- 
penditure would  have  "  paid  "  if  the  ground  saved  from  the 
river  was  to  be  theirs.  But  if,  when  the  offer  that  had  this 
aspect  of  profit  was  refused,  they  had  nevertheless  persisted 
in  the  plan,  and  merely  taking  security  for  the  return  of  their 
outlay,  lent  the  funds  for  the  work,  and  thus  saved  a  whole 
race  of  human  souls  from  perishing  in  a  pestiferous  fen  (as,  I 
presume,  some  among  them  would,  at  personal  risk,  have 
dragged  any  one  drowning  creature  out  of  the  current  of  the 
stream,  and  not  expected  payment  therefor),  such  expendi- 
ture would  have  precisely  corresponded  to  the  use  of  his 
power  made,  in  the  first  instance,  by  our  supposed  richer 
peasant — it  would  have  been  the  king's,  of  grace,  instead  of 
the  usurer's,  for  gain. 

148.  "  Impossible,  absurd,  Utopian  ! 99  exclaim  nine-tenths 
of  the  few  readers  whom  these  words  may  find. 

No,  good  reader,  this  is  not  Utopian :  but  I  will  tell  you 
what  would  have  seemed,  if  we  had  not  seen  it,  Utopian  on 
the  side  of  evil  instead  of  good  ;  that  ever  men  should  have 
come  to  value  their  money  so  much  more  than  their  lives,  that  if 
you  call  upon  them  to  become  soldiers,  and  take  chance  of  a 
bullet  through  their  heart,  and  of  wife  and  children  being  left 
desolate,  for  their  pride's  sake,  they  will  do  it  gaily,  without 
thinking  twice  ;  but  if  you  ask  them,  for  their  country's  sake, 


212 


MVNEEA  PULVER1S. 


to  spend  a  hundred  pounds  without  security  of  getting  back  a 
hundred-and-five,*  they  will  laugh  in  your  faca 

149.  Not  but  that  also  this  game  of  life-giving  and  taking 
is,  in  the  end,  somewhat  more  costly  than  other  forms  of  play 
might  be.  Rifle  practice  is,  indeed,  a  not  unhealthy  pastime, 
and  a  feather  on  the  top  of  the  head  is  a  pleasing  appendage ; 
but  while  learning  the  stops  and  fingering  of  the  sweet  instru- 
ment, does  no  one  ever  calculate  the  cost  of  an  overture  ? 
What  melody  does  Tityrus  meditate  on  his  tenderly  spiral 
pipe  ?  The  leaden  seed  of  it,  broad-cast,  true  conical  "  Dents 
de  Lion  "  seed — needing  less  allowance  for  the  wind  than  is 
usual  with  that  kind  of  herb — what  crop  are  you  likely  to  have 
of  it  ?  Suppose,  instead  of  this  volunteer  marching  and 
countermarching,  you  were  to  do  a  little  volunteer  ploughing 
and  counter-ploughing  ?  It  is  more  difficult  to  do  it  straight : 
the  dust  of  the  earth,  so  disturbed,  is  more  grateful  than  for 
merely  rhythmic  footsteps.  Golden  cups,  also,  given  for  good 
ploughing,  would  be  more  suitable  in  colour  :  (ruby  glass,  for 
the  wine  which  "  giveth  his  colour  "  on  the  ground,  might  be 
fitter  for  the  rifle  prize  in  ladies'  hands).  Or,  conceive  a  little 
volunteer  exercise  with  the  spade,  other  than  such  as  is  needed 

*  I  have  not  hitherto  touched  on  the  subject  of  interest  of  money  ;  it 
is  too  complex,  and  must  be  reserved  for  its  proper  place  in  the  body  of 
the  work.  The  definition  of  interest  (apart  from  compensation  for  risk) 
is,  * £  the  exponent  of  the  comfort  of  accomplished  labour,  separated  from 
its  power  ;  "  the  power  being  what  is  lent  :  and  the  French  economists 
who  have  maintained  the  entire  illegality  of  interest  are  wrong  ;  yet  by 
no  means  so  curiously  or  wildly  wrong  as  the  English  and  French  ones 
opposed  to  them,  whose  opinions  have  been  collected  by  Dr.  Whewell 
at  page  41  of  his  Lectures  ;  it  never  seeming  to  occur  to  the  mind  of  the 
compiler,  any  more  than  to  the  writers  whom  he  quotes,  that  it  is  quite 
possible,  and  even  (according  to  Jewish  proverb)  prudent,  for  men  to 
hoard  as  ants  and  mice  do,  for  use,  not  usury  ;  and  lay  by  something 
for  winter  nights,  in  the  expectation  of  rather  sharing  than  lending  the 
scrapings.  My  Savoyard  squirrels  would  pass  a  pleasant  time  of  it  un- 
der the  snow-laden  pine-branches,  if  they  always  declined  to  economize 
because  no  one  would  pay  them  interest  on  nuts. 

[I  leave  this  note  as  it  stood  :  but,  as  I  have  above  stated,  should  now 
side  wholly  with  the  French  economists  spoken  of,  in  asserting  the  ab- 
solute illegality  of  interest.] 


HUN  ERA  PULVEETS. 


213 


for  moat  and  breastwork,  or  even  for  the  burial  of  the  fruit  ol 
the  leaden  avena-seed,  subject  to  the  shrill  Lemures'  criti* 
cism — 

AVer  liat  das  Hans  so  sclileclit  gebauet  ? 

If  you  were  to  embank  Lincolnshire  more  stoutly  against  the 
sea  ?  or  strip  the  peat  of  Sol  way,  or  plant  Plinlimmon  moors 
with  larch — then,  in  due  season,  some  amateur  reaping  and 
threshing  ? 

"Nay,  we  reap  and  thresh  by  steam,  in  these  advanced 
days." 

I  know  it,  my  wise  and  economical  friends.  The  stout  arms 
God  gave  you  to  win  your  bread  by,  you  would  fain  shoot 
your  neighbours,  and  God's  sweet  singers  with  ;  *  then  you 
invoke  the  fiends  to  your  farm-service  ;  and — 

When  young  and  old  come  forth  to  play 

On  a  sulphurous  holiday, 

Tell  how  the  darkling  goblin  sweat 

(His  feast  of  cinders  duly  set), 

And,  belching  night,  where  breathed  the  morn, 

His  shadowy  flail  hath  threshed  the  corn 

That  ten  day-labourers  could  not  end. 

150.  Going  back  to  the  matter  in  hand,  we  will  press  the 
example  closer.    On  a  green  knoll  above  that  plain  of  the 

*  Compare  Chaucer's  feeling  respecting  birds  (from  Canace's  falcon, 
to  the  nightingale,  singing,  "  Domine,  labia — "to  the  Lord  of  Love), 
with  the  usual  modern  British  sentiments  on  this  subject.  Or  eves 
Cowley's  :  — 

"  What  prince's  choir  of  music  can  excel 
That  which  within  this  shade  does  dwell, 
To  which  we  nothing  pay,  or  give, 
They,  like  all  other  poets,  live 

Without  reward,  or  thanks  for  their  obliging  pains  ! 
'Tis  well  if  they  become  not  prey." 

Yes  ;  it  is  better  than  well  ;  particularly  since  the  seed  sown  by  the  way- 
side has  been  protected  by  the  peculiar  appropriation  of  part  of  the  church- 
rates  in  our  country  parishes.  See  the  remonstrance  from  a  "  Country 
Parson, "  in  The  Times  of  June  4th  (or  5th  ;  the  letter  is  dated  Juna 


2U 


M  UN  ERA  PULVER1S. 


Arve,  between  Cluse  and  Bonneville,  there  was,  in  the  yeai 
I860,  a  cottage,  inhabited  by  a  well-doing  family — man  and 
wife,  three  children,  and  the  grandmother.  I  call  it.  a  cot- 
tage, but  in  truth,  it  was  a  large  chimney  on  the  ground,  wide 
at  the  bottom,  so  that  the  family  might  live  round  the  fire  ; 
lighted  by  one  small  broken  window,  and  entered  by  an  un- 
closing door.  The  family,  I  say,  was  "  well-doing  ;  "  at  least 
it  was  hopeful  and  cheerful ;  the  wife  healthy,  the  children, 
for  Savoyards,  pretty  and  active,  but  the  husband  threatened 
with  decline,  from  exposure  under  the  cliffs  of  the  Mont  Vergi 
by  day,  and  to  draughts  between  every  plank  of  his  chimney 
in  the  frosty  nights. 

" Why  could  he  not  plaster  the  chinks?"  asks  the  prac- 
tical reader.  For  the  same  reason  that  your  child  cannot 
wash  its  face  and  hands  till  you  have  washed  them  many  a  day 
for  it,  and  will  not  wash  them  wThen  it  can,  till  you  force  it. 

151.  I  passed  this  cottage  often  in  my  walks,  had  its  win- 
dow and  door  mended  ;  sometimes  mended  also  a  little  the 
meal  of  sour  bread  and  broth,  and  generally  got  kind  greeting 
and  smile  from  the  face  of  young  or  old  ;  which  greeting, 
this  year,  narrowed  itself  into  the  half-recognizing  stare  of 
the  elder  child,  and  the  old  woman's  tears  ;  for  the  father 
and  mother  were  both  dead, — one  of  sickness,  the  other  of 
sorrow.  It  happened  that  I  passed  not  alone,  but  with  a 
companion,  a  practised  English  joiner,  who,  while  these  peo- 
ple were  dying  of  cold,  had  been  employed  from  six  in  the 
morning  to  six  in  the  evening,  for  two  months,  ill  fitting, 
without  nails,  the  panels  of  a  single  door  in  a  large  house  in 
London.  Three  days  of  his  work  taken,  at  the  right  time, 
from  fastening  the  oak  panels  with  useless  precision,  and  ap- 

3rd5)  1862: — "  I  have  heard  at  a  vestry  meeting  a  good  deal  of  higgling 
over  a  few  shillings'  outlay  in  cleaning  the  church  ;  but  I  have  never 
heard  any  dissatisfaction  expressed  on  account  of  that  part  of  the  rate 
which  is  invested  in  50  or  100  dozens  of  birds'  heads.'* 

[If  we  could  trace  the  innermost  of  all  causes  of  modern  war,  I  be- 
lieve it  would  be  found,  not  in  the  avarice  nor  ambition  of  nations,  but 
in  the  mere  idleness  of  the  upper  classes.  They  have  nothing  to  do 
but  to  teach  the  peasantry  to  kill  each  other.] 


M  UN  ERA  PULVEUI& 


215 


plied  to  fasten  the  larch  timbers  with  decent  strength,  would 
have  saved  these  Savoyards'  lives.  He  would  have  been  main- 
tained equally  ;.  (I  suppose  him  equally  paid  for  his  work  by  the 
owner  of  the  greater  house,  only  the  work  not  consumed  self- 
ishly on  his  own  wails  ;)  and  the  two  peasants,  and  eventually, 
probably  their  children,  saved. 

152.  There  are,  therefore, — let  me  finally  enforce,  and 
leave  with  the  reader,  this  broad  conclusion, — three  things 
to  be  considered  in  empkmng  any  poor  person.  It  is  not 
enough  to  give  him  employment.  You  must  employ  him 
first  to  produce  useful  things  ;  secondly,  of  the  several  (sup- 
pose equally  useful)  things  he  can  equally  well  produce,  you 
must  set  him  to  make  that  which  will  cause  him  to  lead  the 
healthiest  life  ;  lastly,  of  the  things  produced,  it  remains  a 
question  of  wisdom  and  conscience  how  much  you  are  to  take 
yourself,  and  how  much  to  leave  to  others.  A  large  quantity, 
remember,  unless  you  destroy  it,  must  always  be  so  left  at 
one  time  or  another  ;  the  only  questions  you  have  to  decide 
are,  not  ivhat  you  will  give,  but  when,  and  how,  and  to  whom, 
you  will  give,  The  natural  law  of  human  life  is,  of  course, 
that  in  youth  a  man  shall  labour  and  lay  by  store  for  his  old 
age,  and  when  age  comes,  shall  use  what  he  has  laid  by, 
gradually  slackening  his  toil,  and  allowing  himself  more  frank 
use  of  his  store  ;  taking  care  always  to  leave  himself  as  much 
as  will  surely  suffice  for  him  beyond  any  possible  length  of 
life.  What  he  has  gained,  or  by  tranquil  and  unanxious  toil 
continues  to  gain,  more  than  is  enough  for  his  own  need,  he 
ought  so  to  administer,  while  he  yet  lives,  as  to  see  the  good 
of  it  again  beginning,  in  other  hands ;  for  thus  he  has  him- 
self the  greatest  sum  of  pleasure  from  it,  and  faithfully  uses 
his  sagacity  in  its  control.  "Whereas  most  men,  it  appears, 
dislike  the  sight  of  their  fortunes  going  out  into  service  again, 
and  say  to  themselves, — "I  can  indeed  nowise  prevent  this 
money  from  falling  at  last  into  the  hands  of  others,  nor  hinder 
the  good  of  it  from  becoming  theirs,  not  mine  ;  but  at  least 
let  a  merciful  death  save  me  from  being  a  witness  of  their 
satisfaction  ;  and  may  God  so  far  be  gracious  to  me  as  to  let 
no  good  come  of  any  of  this  money  of  mine  before  my  eyes." 


21(3 


MUNERA  PULVERI& 


153.  Supposing  this  feeling  unconquerable,  the  safest  waj 
of  rationally  indulging  it  would  be  for  the  capitalist  at  once 
to  spend  all  his  fortune  on  himself,  which  might  actually,  in 
many  cases,  be  quite  the  lightest  as  well  as  the  pleasantest 
thing  to  do,  if  he  had  just  tastes  and  worthy  passions.  But, 
whether  for  himself  only,  or  through  the  hands,  and  for  the 
sake,  of  others  also,  the  law  of  wise  life  is,  that  the  maker  of 
the  money  shall  also  be  the  spender  of  it,  and  spend  it,  ap- 
proximately, all,  before  he  dies ;  so  that  his  true  ambition  as 
an  economist  should  be,  to  die,  not  as  rich,  but  as  poor,  as 
possible,*  calculating  the  ebb  tide  of  possession  in  true  and 
calm  proportion  to  the  ebb  tide  of  life.  Which  law,  checking 
the  wing  of  accumulative  desire  in  the  mid- volley,  f  and  lead- 
ing to  peace  of  possession  and  fulness  of  fruition  in  old  age, 
is  also  wholesome,  in  that  by  the  freedom  of  gift,  together 
with  present  help  and  counsel,  it  at  once  endears  and  dignifies 
age  in  the  sight  of  youth,  which  then  no  longer  strips  the 
bodies  of  the  dead,  but  receives  the  grace  of  the  living.  Its 
chief  use  would  (or  will  be,  for  men  are  indeed  capable  of 
attaining  to  this  much  use  of  their  reason),  that  some  temper- 
ance and  measure  will  be  put  to  the  acquisitiveness  of  com- 
merce.];   For  as  things  stand,  a  man  holds  it  his  duty  to  be 

[*  See  the  Life  of  Fenelon.  u  The  labouring  peasantry  were  at  all 
times  the  objects  of  his  tenderest  care  ;  his  palace  at  Cambray,  with  all 
his  books  and  writings,  being  consumed  by  fire,  he  bore  the  misfortune 
with  unruffled  calmness,  and  said  it  was  better  his  palace  should  be 
burnt  than  the  cottage  of  a  poor  peasant.'1  (These  thoroughly  good  men 
always  go  too  far,  and  lose  their  power  over  the  mass.)  He  died  ex- 
emplifying the  mean  he  had  always  observed  between  prodigality  and 
avarice,  leaving  neither  debts  nor  money.] 

f  tcai  ireyiay  r,yov;j.evovs  qIvoli  fj.7}  rb  t)]v  ohaiav  eAarroj  ttokhv  aWa  rh  t).p 
airX-rjcrrlau  ttKc'.ox  "And  thinking  (wisely)  that  poverty  consists  not  in 
making  one's  possessions  less,  but  one's  avarice  more." — Jjtins,  v.  8. 
Read  the  context,  and  compare.  u  He  who  spends  for  all  that  is  noble, 
and  gains  by  nothing  but  what  is  just,  will  hardly  be  notably  wealthy , 
or  distress i'ully  poor." — Tjaws.  v.  42. 

X  The  fury  of  modern  trade  arises  chiefly  out  of  the  possibility  of 
making  sudden  fortunes  by  largeness  of  transaction,  and  accident  of 
discovery  or  contrivance.  I  have  no  doubt  that  the  final  interest  oi 
every  nation  is  to  check  the  action  of  these  commercial  lotteries  ;  and 


MUNERA  PULVERIS. 


217 


temperate  in  his  food,  and  of  his  body,  but  for  no  duty  to  be 
temperate  in  his  riches,  and  of  his  mind.  He  sees  that  he 
ought  not  to  waste  his  youth  and  his  flesh  for  luxury  ;  but  he 
will  waste  his  age,  and  his  soul,  for  money,  and  think  he  does 
no  wrong,  nor  know  the  delirium  tremens  of  the  intellect  for 
disease.  But  the  law  of  life  is,  that  a  man  should  fix  the  sum 
he  desires  to  make  annually,  as  the  food  lie  desires  to  eat 
daily  ;  and  stay  when  he  has  reached  the  limit,  refusing  in- 
crease 01  business,  and  leaving  it  to  others,  so  obtaining  due 
freedom  of  time  for  better  thoughts.*  How  the  gluttony  of 
business  is  punished,  a  bill  of  health  for  the  principals  of  the 
richest  city  houses,  issued  annually,  would  show  in  a  suffi- 
ciently impressive  manner. 

154.  I  know,  of  course,  that  these  statements  will  be  re- 
ceived by  the  modern  merchant  as  an  active  border  rider  of 
the  sixteenth  century  would  have  heard  of  its  being  proper 
Tor  men  of  the  Marches  to  get  their  living  by  the  spade,  in- 
stead of  the  spur.  But  my  business  is  only  to  state  veracities 
and  necessities  ;  I  neither  look  for  the  acceptance  of  the  one, 
nor  hope  for  the  nearness  of  the  other.  Near  or  distant,  the 
day  will  assuredly  come  when  the  merchants  of  a  state  shall 
be  its  true  ministers  of  exchange,  its  porters,  in  the  double 
sense  of  carriers  and  gate-keepers,  bringing  all  lands  into 
frank  and  faithful  communication,  and  knowing  for  their 
master  of  guild,  Hermes  the  herald,  instead  of  Mercury  the 
gain-guarder. 

155.  And  now,  finally,  for  immediate  rule  to  all  who  will  ac- 
cept it. 

The  distress  of  any  population  means  that  they  need  food, 
house-room,  clothes,  and  fuel.  You  can  never,  therefore,  be 
wrong  in  employing  any  labourer  to  produce  food,  house- 
room,  clothes,  or  fuel  ;  but  you  are  always  wrong  if  you  em- 
ploy him  to  produce  nothing,  (for  then  some  other  labourer 

that  all  great  accidental  gains  or  losses  should  be  national,  — not  individ- 
ual. I>ut  speculation  absolute,  unconnected  with  commercial  effort,  is 
an  unmitigated  evil  in  a  state,  and  the  root  of  countless  evils  beside. 

[*  I  desire  in  the  strongest  terms  to  reinforce  all  that  is  contained  in 
this  paragraph.] 


218 


MUNEEA  rULVERIS. 


must  be  worked  double  time  to  feed  him) ;  and  you  are  gen- 
erally wrong,  at  present,  if  you  employ  him  (unless  he  can  da 
nothing  else)  to  produce  works  of  art  or  luxuries  ;  because 
modern  art  is  mostly  on  a  false  basis,  and  modern  luxury  is 
crimin airy  great.  * 

156.  The  way  to  produce  more  food  is  mainly  to  bring  in 
fresh  ground,  and  increase  facilities  of  carriage  ; — to  break 
rock,  exchange  earth,  drain  the  moist,  and  water  the  dry,  to 
mend  roads,  and  build  harbours  of  refuge.  Taxation  thus 
spent  will  annihilate  taxation,  but  spent  in  war,  it  annihilates 
revenue. 

157.  The  way  to  produce  house-room  is  to  apply  your  force 
first  to  the  humblest  dwellings.  When  your  brick-layers  are 
out  of  employ,  do  not  build  splendid  new  streets,  but  better 
the  old  ones  ;  send  your  paviours  and  slaters  to  the  poorest 
villages,  and  see  that  your  poor  are  healthily  lodged,  before 
you  try  your  hand  on  stately  architecture.  You  will  find  its 
stateliness  rise  better  under  the  trowel  afterwards  ;  and  we  do 

*  It  is  especially  necessary  that  the  reader  should  keep  his  mind  fixed 
on  the  methods  of  consumption  and  destruction,  as  the  true  sources  of 
national  poverty.  Men  are  apt  to  call  every  exchange  "expenditure," 
"but  it  is  only  consumption  which  is  expenditure.  A  large  number  of 
the  purchases  made  by  the  richer  classes  are  mere  forms  of  interchange 
of  unused  property,  wholly  without  effect  on  national  prosperity.  It 
matters  nothing  to  the  state  whether,  if  a  china  pipkin  be  rated  a*s  worth 
a  hundred  pounds,  A  has  the  pipkin  and  B  the  pounds,  or  A  the  pounds 
and  B  the  pipkin.  But  if  the  pipkin  is  pretty,  and  A  or  B  breaks  it, 
there  is  national  loss,  not  otherwise.  So  again,  when  the  loss  has  really 
taken  place,  no  shifting  of  the  shoulders  that  bear  it  will  do  away  with 
the  reality  of  it.  There  is  an  intensely  ludicrous  notion  in  the  public 
mind  respecting  the  abolishment  of  debt  by  denying  it.  When  a  debt 
is  denied,  the  lender  loses  instead  of  the  borrower,  that  is  all ;  the  loss 
is  precisely,  accurately,  everlastingly  the  same.  The  Americans  borrow 
money  to  spend  in  blowing  up  their  own  houses.  They  deny  their  debt, 
by  one -third  already  [1863],  gold  being  at  fifty  premium  ;  and  they  will 
probably  deny  it  wholly.  That  merely  means  that  the  holders  of  the 
notes  are  to  be  the  losers  instead  of  the  issuers.  The  quantity  of  loss 
is  precisely  equal,  and  irrevocable  ;  it  is  the  quantity  of  human  industry 
spent  in  effecting  the  explosion,  plus  the  quantity  of  goods  exploded, 
Honour  only  decides  who  shall  pay  the  sum  lost  not  whether  it  is  to  hf 
paid  or  not.    Faid  it  must  be,  and  to  the  uttermost  farthing. 


MTJNERA  PULVERIS. 


219 


do  not  yet  build  so  well  that  we  need  hasten  to  display  our 
skill  to  future  ages.  Had  the  labour  which  has  decorated  the 
Houses  of  Parliament  filled,  instead,  rents  in  walls  and  roofs 
throughout  the  county  of  Middlesex  ;  and  our  deputies  met 
to  talk  within  massive  walls  that  would  have  needed  no  stucco 
for  five  hundred  years, — the  decoration  might  have  been  after- 
wards, and  the  talk  now.  And  touching  even  our  highly  con- 
scientious church  building,  it  may  be  well  to  remember  that 
in  the  best  days  of  church  plans,  their  masons  called  them- 
selves "  logeurs  du  bon  Dieu  ; "  and  that  since,  according  to 
the  most  trusted  reports,  God  spends  a  good  deal  of  His  time 
in  cottages  as  well  as  in  churches,  He  might  perhaps  like  to 
be  a  little  better  lodged  there  also. 

158.  The  way  to  get  more  clothes  is — not,  necessarily,  to 
get  more  cotton.  There  were  words  written  twenty  years 
ago  *  which  would  have  saved  many  of  us  some  shivering, 
had  they  been  minded  in  time.    Shall  we  read  them  again  ? 

"  The  Continental  people,  it  would  seem,  are  importing  our 
machinery,  beginning  to  spin  cotton,  and  manufacture  for 
themselves  ;  to  cut  us  out  of  this  market,  and  then  out  of 
that !  Sad  news,  indeed  ;  but  irremediable.  By  no  means 
the  saddest  news — the  saddest  news,  is  that  we  should  find 
our  national  existence,  as  I  sometimes  hear  it  said,  depend 
on  selling  manufactured  cotton  at  a  farthing  an  ell  cheaper 
than  any  other  people.  A  most  narrow  stand  for  a  great  na- 
tion to  base  itself  on  !  A  stand  which,  with  all  the  Corn-law 
abrogations  conceivable,  I  do  not  think  will  be  capable  of  en- 
during. 

"  My  friends,  suppose  we  quitted  that  stand;  suppose  we 
came  honestly  down  from  it  and  said — '  This  is  our  minimum 
of  cotton  prices  ;  we  care  not,  for  the  present,  to  make  cotton 
any  cheaper.  Do  you,  if  it  seem  so  blessed  to  you,  make  cot- 
ton cheaper.    Fill  your  lungs  with  cotton  fur,  your  heart 

[*  (Past  and  Present,  Chap.  IX.  of  Third  Section.)  To  think  that  for 
these  twenty— now  twenty-six — years,  this  one  voice  of  Carlyle's  has 
been  the  only  faithful  and  useful  utterance  in  all  England,  and  has 
Bounded  through  all  these  years  in  vain !  See  Fors  Claiigera,  Letter 
X] 


220 


MUNERA  PULVEBI8. 


with  copperas  fumes,  with  rage  and  mutiny ;  become  ye  the 
general  gnomes  of  Europe,  slaves  of  the  lamp  ! '  I  admire  a 
nation  which  fancies  it  will  die  if  it  do  not  undersell  all  other 
nations  to  the  end  of  the  world.  Brothers,  we  will  cease  to 
undersell  them  ;  we  will  be  content  to  equal-sell  them  ;  to  be 
happy  selling  equally  with  them  !  I  do  not  see  the  use  of  un» 
derselling  them :  cotton-cloth  is  already  twTopence  a  yard,  or 
lower  ;  and  yet  bare  backs  were  never  more  numerous  among 
us.  Let  inventive  men  cease  to  spend  their  existence  inces- 
santly contriving  how  cotton  can  be  made  cheaper  ;  and  try 
to  invent  a  little  how  cotton  at  its  present  cheapness  could  be 
somewhat  justlier  divided  among  us. 

"  Let  inventive  men  consider — whether  the  secret  of  this 
universe  does  after  all  consist  in  making  money.  With  a  hell 
which  means — '  failing  to  make  money/  I  do  not  think  there 
is  any  heaven  possible  that  would  suit  one  well.  In  brief,  all 
this  Mammon  gospel  of  supply-and- demand,  competition, 
laissez /aire,  and  devil  take  the  hindmost  (foremost,  is  it  not, 
rather,  Mr.  Caiiyle  ?),  '  begins  to  be  one  of  the  shabbiest 
gospels  ever  preached.' " 

159.  The  way  to  produce  more  fuel  *  is  first  to  make  your 
coal  mines  safer,  by  sinking  more  shafts  ;  then  set  all  your 
convicts  to  work  in  them,  and  if,  as  is  to  be  hoped,  you  suc- 
ceed in  diminishing  the  supply  of  that  sort  of  labourer,  con- 
sider what  means  there  may  be,  first,  of  growing  forest  where 
its  growth  will  improve  climate  ;  secondly,  of  splintering  the 
forests  which  now  make  continents  of  fruitful  land  pathless  and 
poisonous,  into  fagots  for  fire  ; — so  gaining  at  once  dominion 
icewards  and  sunwards.  Your  steam  power  has  been  given 
(you  will  find  eventually)  for  work  such  as  that :  and  not  for 
excursion  trains,  to  give  the  labourer  a  moment's  breath,  at 
the  peril  of  his  breath  for  ever,  from  amidst  the  cities  which 
it  has  crushed  into  masses  of  corruption.  When  you  know 
how  to  build  cities,  and  how  to  rule  them,  you  will  be  able  to 

[*  We  don't  want  to  produce  more  fuel  just  now,  but  much  less  ;  and 
to  use  what  we  get  for  cooking  and  warming  ourselves,  instead  of  tot 
running  from  place  to  place.] 


MUNERA  PULVER1S. 


221 


breathe  in  their  streets,  and  the  "  excursion  "  will  be  the  af- 
ternoon's walk  or  game  in  the  fields  round  them. 

160.  "But  nothing  of  this  work  wdll  pay  ?  " 

No  ;  no  more  than  it  pays  to  dust  your  rooms,  or  wash 
your  doorsteps.  It  will  pay  ;  not  at  first  in  currency,  but 
in  that  which  is  the  end  and  the  source  of  currency, — in 
life  ;  (and  in  currency  richly  afterwards).  It  will  pay  in  that 
which  is  more  than  life, — in  light,  whose  true  price  has  not 
yet  been  reckoned  in  any  currency,  and  yet  into  the  image  oL 
which,  all  wealth,  one  way  or  other,  must  be  cast.  For  your 
riches  must  either  be  as  the  lightning,  which, 

Begot  but  in  a  cloud, 
Though  shining  bright,  and  speaking  loud, 
Whilst  it  begins,  concludes  its  violent  race  ; 
And,  where  it  gilds,  it  wounds  the  place  ; — 

or  else,  as  the  lightning  of  the  sacred  sign,  which  shines 
from  one  part  of  the  heaven  to  the  other.  There  is  no 
other  choice  ;  you  must  either  take  dust  for  deity,  spectre 
for  possession,  fettered  dream  for  life,  and  for  epitaph,  this 
reversed  verse  of  the  great  Hebrew  hymn  of  economy  (Psalm 
cxii.) : — "  He  hath  gathered  together,  he  hath  stripped  the 
poor,  his  iniquity  remaineth  for  ever  :  " — or  else,  having  the  sun 
of  justice  to  shine  on  you,  and  the  sincere  substance  of  good 
in  your  possession,  and  the  pure  law  and  liberty  of  life  within 
you,  leave  men  to  write  this  better  legend  over  your  grave 

"  He  hath  dispersed  abroad.  He  hath  given  to  the  poor. 
His  righteousness  remaineth  for  ever." 


APPENDICES. 


I  havk  brought  together  in  these  last  pages  a  few  notes, 
which  were  not  properly  to  be  incorporated  with  the  text, 
and  which,  at  the  bottom  of  pages,  checked  the  reader's 
attention  to  the  main  argument.  They  contain,  however, 
several  statements  to  which  I  wish  to  be  able  to  refer,  or  have 
already  referred,  in  other  of  my  books,  so  that  I  think  right 
to  preserve  them.] 


APPENDIX  I.— (p.  22.) 

The  greatest  of  all  economists  are  those  most  opposed  to  the 
doctrine  of  "  laissez  faire,"  namely,  the  fortifying  virtues, 
which  the  wisest  men  of  all  time  have  arranged  under  the 
general  heads  of  Prudence,  or  Discretion  (the  spirit  which 
discerns  and  adopts  rightly)  ;  Justice  (the  spirit  which  rules 
and  divides  rightly)  ;  Fortitude  (the  spirit  which  persists  and 
endures  rightly)  ;  and  Temperance  (the  spirit  wThich  stops 
and  refuses  rightly).  These  cardinal  and  sentinel  virtues  are 
not  only  the  means  of  protecting  and  prolonging  life  itself, 
but  they  are  the  chief  guards,  or  sources,  of  the  material 
means  of  life,  and  the  governing  powers  and  princes  of 
economy.  Thus,  precisely  according  to  the  number  of  just 
men  in  a  nation,  is  their  power  of  avoiding  either  intestine  or 
foreign  war.  All  disputes  may  be  peaceably  settled,  if  a  suf- 
ficient number  of  persons  have  been  trained  to  submit  to  the 
principles  of  justice,  while  the  necessity  for  war  is  in  direct 
ratio  to  the  number  of  unjust  persons  who  are  incapable  of 
determining  a  quarrel  but  by  violence.  "Whether  the  injus- 
tice take  the  form  of  the  desire  of  dominion,  or  of  refusal  ta 
submit  to  it,  or  of  lust  of  territory,  or  lust  of  money,  or  of 


MUNERA  PULVERIS. 


223 


mere  irregular  passion  and  wanton  will,  the  result  is  economi- 
cally the  game ; — loss  of  the  quantity  of  power  and  life  con- 
sumed in  repressing  the  injustice,  added  to  the  material  and 
moral  destruction  caused  by  the  fact  of  war.  The  early  civil 
wars  of  England,  and  the  existing  *  war  in  America,  are  curi- 
ous examples — these  under  monarchical,  this  under  republi- 
can, institutions — of  the  results  on  large  masses  of  nations  of 
the  want  of  education  in  principles  of  justice.  But  the  mere 
dread  or  distrust  resulting  from  the  want  of  the  inner  virtues 
of  Faith  and  Charity  prove  often  no  less  costly  than  war  itself. 
The  fear  which  France  and  England  have  of  each  other  costs 
each  nation  about  fifteen  millions  sterling  annually,  besides 
various  paralyses  of  commerce  ;  that  sum  being  spent  in  the 
manufacture  of  means  of  destruction  instead  of  means  of  pro- 
duction. There  is  no  more  reason  in  the  nature  of  things 
that  France  and  England  should  be  hostile  to  each  other  than 
that  England  and  Scotland  should  be,  or  Lancashire  and 
Yorkshire  ;  and  the  reciprocal  terrors  of  the  opposite  sides 
of  the  English  Channel  are  neither  more  necessary,  more  eco- 
nomical, nor  more  virtuous,  than  the  old  riding  and  reiving 
on  the  opposite  flanks  of  the  Cheviots,  or  than  England's  own 
weaving  for  herself  of  crowns  of  thorn,  from  the  stems  of  her 
Red  and  White  roses. 


APPENDIX  II- (p.  34) 

Few  passages  of  the  book  which  at  least  some  part  of  the  na« 
tions  at  present  most  advanced  in  civilization  accept  as  an  ex- 
pression of  final  truth,  have  been  more  distorted  than  those 
bearing  on  Idolatry.  For  the  idolatry  there  denounced  is 
neither  sculpture,  nor  veneration  of  sculpture.  It  is  simply 
the  substitution  of  an  "Eidoloo,"  phantasm,  or  imagination  of 
Good,  for  that  which  is  real  and  enduring  ;  from  the  Highest 
Living  Good,  which  gives  life,  to  the  lowest  material  good 

[*  Written  in  1862.  I  little  thought  that  when  I  next  corrected  my 
type,  the  "existing"  war  best  illustrative  of  the  sentft^e.  would  b& 
between  Frenchmen  in  the  Elysian  Fields  of  Paris.] 


224 


MUNERA  rULVERIS. 


which  ministers  to  it.  The  Creator,  and  the  things  created, 
which  He  is  said  to  have  "  seen  good  "  in  creating,  are  in  this 
their  eternal  goodness  appointed  always  to  be  "  worshipped," 
— i.  e.,  to  have  goodness  and  worth  ascribed  to  them  from 
the  heart  ;  and  the  sweep  and  range  of  idolatry  extend  to  the 
rejection  of  any  or  all  of  these,  "  calling  evil  good,  and  good 
evil, — putting  bitter  for  sweet,  and  sweet  for  bitter."  *  For 
in  that  rejection  and  substitution  we  betray  the  first  of  all 
Loyalties,  to  the  fixed  Law  of  life,  and  with  resolute  opposite 
loyalty  serve  our  own  imagination  of  good,  which  is  the  law, 
not  of  the  House,  but  of  the  Grave,  (otherwise  called  the  law 
of  "  mark  missing,"  which  we  translate  "  law  of  Sin  ")  ;  these 
"two  masters,"  between  whose  services  we  have  to  choose, 
being  otherwise  distinguished  as  God  and  Mammon,  which 
Mammon,  though  we  narrowly  take  it  as  the  power  of  money 
only,  is  in  truth  the  great  evil  Spirit  of  false  and  fond  desire, 
or  "  Covetousness,  which  is  Idolatry."  So  that  Iconoclasm — 
image-breaking — is  easy  ;  but  an  Idol  cannot  be  broken — it 
must  be  forsaken  ;  and  this  is  not  so  easy,  either  to  do,  or 
persuade  to  doing.  For  men  may  readily  be  convinced  of  the 
weakness  of  an  image  ;  but  not  of  the  emptiness  of  an  imagi- 
nation. 


APPENDIX  HI— (p.  36.) 

I  have  not  attempted  to  support,  by  the  authority  of  other 
writers,  any  of  the  statements  made  in  these  papers  ;  indeed, 
if  such  authorities  were  rightly  collected,  there  would  be  no 
occasion  for  my  writing  at  all.  Even  in  the  scattered  pas- 
sages referring  to  this  subject  in  three  books  of  Carlyle's — 
Sartor  Resartus,  Past  and  Present,  and  the  Latter  Day  Pam- 
phlets,— all  has  been  said  that  needs  to  be  said,  and  far  better 
than  I  shall  ever  say  it  again.  But  the  habit  of  the  public 
mind  at  present  is  to  require  everything  to  be  uttered  dif- 
fusely, loudly,  and  a  hundred  times  over,  before  it  will  listen; 
and  it  has  revolted  against  these  papers  of  mine  as  if  they  con- 
*  Compare  the  close  of  the  Fourth  Lecture  in  Araira  PentdicL 


MU N ERA  PUL  VERTS. 


225 


tained  things  daring  and  new,  when  there  is  not  one  assertion 
in  them  of  which  the  truth  has  not  been  for  ages  known  to 
the  wisest,  and  proclaimed  by  the  most  eloquent  of  men.  It 
svould  be  [I  had  written  will  be  ;  but  have  now  reached  a  time 
of  life  for  which  there  is  but  one  mood — the  conditional,]  a 
far  greater  pleasure  to  me  hereafter,  to  collect  their  words 
than  to  add  to  mine  ;  Horace's  clear  rendering  of  the  sub- 
stance of  the  passages  in  the  text  may  be  found  room  for  at 
once, 

Si  quis  emat  citliaras,  emptas  comportet  in  unum 
Kec  studio  citharae,  nec  Musae  deditus  ulli  ; 
Si  scalpra  et  formas  nan  sutor,  nautica  vela 
Aversus  mercaturis,  delirus  et  aniens 
Undique  dicatur  merito.    Qui  discrepat  istis 
Qui  nummos  aurumque  recondit,  uescius  uti 
Compositis  ;  metuensque  velut  eontingere  sacrum  ? 

[Which  may  be  roughly  thus  translated  : — 

"  Were  anybody  to  buy  fiddles,  and  collect  a  number,  be- 
ing in  no  wise  given  to  fiddling,  nor  fond  of  music :  or  if, 
being  no  cobbler,  he  collected  awls  and  lasts,  or,  having  no 
mind  for  sea-adventure,  bought  sails,  every  one  would  call  him 
a  madman,  and  deservedly.  But  what  difference  is  there  be- 
tween such  a  man  and  one  who  lays  by  coins  and  gold,  and 
does  not  know  how  to  use,  when  he  has  got  them  ?  "] 

With  which  it  i3  perhaps  desirable  also  to  give  Xenophon's 
statement,  it  being  clearer  than  any  English  one  can  be,  owing 
to  the  power  of  the  general  Greek  term  for  wealth,  "  useable 
things." 

[I  have  cut  out  the  Greek  because  I  can't  be  troubled  to 
correct  the  accents,  and  am  always  nervous  about  them  ;  here 
it  is  in  English,  as  well  as  I  can  do  it : — 

"  This  being  so,  it  follows  that  things  are  only  property  to 
the  man  who  knows  how  to  use  them  ;  as  flutes,  for  instance, 
are  property  to  the  man  who  can  pipe  upon  them  respectably  ; 
but  to  one  who  knows  not  how  to  pipe,  they  are  no  property, 
unless  he  can  get  rid  of  them  advantageously.  .  .  For  if 
they  are  not  sold,  the  flutes  are  no  property  (being  service- 


226 


MUNERA  PULVERI8. 


able  for  nothing) ;  but,  sold,  they  become  property.  To 
which  Socrates  made  answer, — £  and  only  then  if  he  knows 
how  to  sell  them,  for  if  he  sell  them  to  another  man  who  can- 
not play  on  them,  still  they  are  no  property/  "] 


APPENDIX  IV.— (p.  39.) 

The  reader  is  to  include  here  in  the  idea  of  "  Government, n 
any  branch  of  the  Executive,  or  even  any  body  of  private  per- 
sons, entrusted  with  the  practical  management  of  public  in« 
terests  unconnected  directly  with  their  owTn  personal  ones. 
In  theoretical  discussions  of  legislative  interference  with  polit- 
ical economy,  it  is  usually,  and  of  course  unnecessarily,  as- 
sumed that  Government  must  be  always  of  that  form  and 
force  in  which  we  have  been  accustomed  to  see  it ; — that  its 
abuses  can  never  be  less,  nor  its  wisdom  greater,  nor  its  pow- 
ers more  numerous.  But,  practically,  the  custom  in  most 
civilized  countries  is,  for  every  man  to  deprecate  the  interfer- 
ence of  Government  as  long  as  things  tell  for  his  personal 
advantage,  and  to  call  for  it  when  they  cease  to  do  so.  The 
request  of  the  Manchester  Economists  to  be  supplied  with 
cotton  by  Government  (the  system  of  supply  and  demand 
having,  for  the  time,  fallen  sorrowfully  short  of  the  expecta- 
tions of  scientific  persons  from  it),  is  an  interesting  case  in 
point.  It  were  to  be  wished  that  less  wide  and  bitter  suffer- 
ing, suffering,  too,  of  the  innocent,  had  been  needed  to  force 
the  nation,  or  some  part  of  it,  to  ask  itself  why  a  body  of 
men,  already  confessedly  capable  of  managing  matters  both 
military  and  divine,  should  not  be  permitted,  or  even  re- 
quested, at  need,  to  provide  in  some  wise  for  sustenance  as 
well  as  for  d  Jer.ce  ;  and  secure,  if  it  might  be, — (and  it 
might,  I  think,  :ven  the  rather  be), — purity  of  bodily,  as  well 
as  of  spiritual,  aliment  ?  "Why,  having  made  many  roads  for 
the  passage  of  armies,  may  they  not  make  a  few  for  the  con- 
veyance of  food  ;  and  after  organizing,  with  applause,  various 
schemes  of  theological  instruction  for  the  Public,  organize, 


MUNEEA  PULVERIS. 


227 


moreover,  some  methods  of  bodily  nourishment  for  them? 
Or  is  the  soul  so  much  less  trustworthy  in  its  instincts  than 
the  stomach,  that  legislation  is  necessary  for  the  one,  but  in- 
applicable to  the  other. 


APPENDIX  V.— (p.  70.) 

I  debated  with  myself  whether  to  make  the  note  on  Homer 
longer  by  examining  the  typical  meaning  of  the  shipwreck  of 
Ulysses,  and  his  escape  from  Charybdis  by  help  of  her  figtree  ; 
but  as  I  should  have  had  to  go  on  to  the  lovely  myth  of  Leu- 
cothea's  veil,  and  did  not  care  to  spoil  this  by  a  hurried  account 
of  it,  I  left  it  for  future  examination  ;  and,  three  days  after  the 
paper  was  published,  observed  that  the  reviewers,  with  their 
customary  helpfulness,  were  endeavouring  to  throw  the  whole 
subject  back  into  confusion  by  dwelling  on  this  single  (as  they 
imagined)  oversight.  I  omitted  also  a  note  on  the  sense  of 
the  word  Xvypov,  with  respect  to  the  pharmacy  of  Circe,  and 
herb-fields  of  Helen,  (compare  its  use  in  Odyssey,  xvh\,  473, 
&c),  which  would  farther  have  illustrated  the  nature  of  the 
Circean  power.  But,  not  to  be  led  too  far  into  the  subtleties 
of  these  myths,  observe  respecting  them  all,  that  even  in  very 
simple  parables,  it  is  not  always  easy  to  attach  indisputable 
meaning  to  every  part  of  them.  I  recollect  some  years  ago, 
throwing  an  assembly  of  learned  persons  who  had  met  to  de- 
light themselves  with  interpretations  of  the  parable  of  the 
prodigal  son,  (interpretations  which  had  up  to  that  moment 
°s  very  smoothly,)  into  mute  indignation,  by  inadvertently 
ag  who  the  wnprodigal  son  was,  and  what  was  to  be  learr 
his  example.  The  leading  divine  of  the  company,  Mi. 
Molyneux,  at  last  explained  to  me  that  the  unprodigal  son  was 
a  lay  figure,  put  in  for  dramatic  effect,  to  make  the  story  pret- 
tier, and  that  no  note  was  to  be  taken  of  him.  Without,  how- 
ever, admitting  that  Homer  put  in  the  last  escape  of  Ulysses 
merely  to  make  his  story  prettier,  this  is  nevertheless  true  of 
fill  Greek  myths,  that  they  have  many  opposite  lights  and 


228 


MUNERA  PULVERI8, 


shades  ;  they  are  as  changeful  as  opal,  and  like  opal,  usually 
have  one  colour  by  reflected,  and  another  by  transmitted  light 
But  they  are  true  jewels  for  all  that,  and  full  of  noble  enchant- 
ment for  those  who  can  use  them  ;  for  those  who  cannot,  I  am 
content  to  repeat  the  words  I  wrote  four  years  ago,  in  the  ap~ 
pendix  to  the  Two  Paths — 

"  The  entire  purpose  of  a  great  thinker  may  be  difficult  to 
fathom,  and  we  may  be  over  and  over  again  more  or  less  mis- 
taken in  guessing  at  his  meaning ;  but  the  real,  profound, 
nay,  quite  bottomless  and  unredeemable  mistake,  is  the  fool's 
thought,  that  he  had  no  meaning. " 


APPENDIX  VL— (p.  84) 

The  derivation  of  words  is  like  that  of  rivers  :  there  is  one 
real  source,  usually  small,  unlikely,  and  difficult  to  find,  far  up 
among  the  hills  ;  then,  as  the  word  flows  on  and  comes  into 
service,  it  takes  in  the  force  of  other  words  from  other  sources, 
and  becomes  quite  another  word — often  much  more  than  one 
word,  after  the  junction — a  word  as  it  were  of  many  waters, 
sometimes  both  sweet  and  bitter.  Thus  the  whole  force  of 
our  English  "  charity  "  depends  on  the  guttural  in  "charis" 
getting  confused  with  the  c  of  the  Latin  "  earns  ; "  thencefor- 
ward throughout  the  middle  ages,  the  two  ideas  ran  on  to- 
gether, and  both  got  confused  with  St.  Paul's  dyd-vr),  which 
expresses  a  different  idea  in  all  sorts  of  ways  ;  our  "  charity  f 
having  not  only  brought  in  the  entirely  foreign  sense  of  alms- 
giving, but  lost  the  essential  sense  of  contentment,  and  lost 
much  more  in  getting  too  far  away  from  the  "charis"  of  the 
final  Gospel  benedictions.  For  truly  it  is  fine  Christianity  we 
have  come  to,  which,  professing  to  expect  the  perpetual  grace 
or  charity  of  its  Founder,  has  not  itself  grace  or  charity  enough 
to  hinder  it  from  overreaching  its  friends  in  sixpenny  bargains  ; 
and  which,  supplicating  evening  and  morning  the  forgiveness 
of  its  own  debts,  goes  forth  at  noon  to  take  its  fellow-servants 
by  the  throat,  saying, — not  merely  "Pay  me  that  thou  owest/ 
but  "  Pay  me  that  thou  owest  me  not" 


MUNERA  PULVERI8. 


229 


It  is  true  that  we  sometimes  wear  Ophelia's  rue  with  a  dif- 
ference, and  call  it  "  Herb  o'  grace  o'  Sundays,"  taking  conso- 
lation out  of  the  offertory  with — "  Look,  what  he  layeth  out, 
it  shall  be  paid  him  again."  Comfortable  words  indeed,  and 
good  to  set  against  the  old  royalty  of  Largesse — 

Whose  moste  joie  was,  I  wis, 

When  that  she  gave,  and  said,  4 1  Have  this." 

[I  am  glad  to  end,  for  this  time,  with  these  lovely  words  of 
Chaucer.  We  have  heard  only  too  much  lately  of  "  Indis- 
criminate charity,"  with  implied  reproval,  not  of  the  Indiscrim- 
ination merely,  but  of  the  Charity  also.  We  have  partly  suc- 
ceeded in  enforcing  on  the  minds  of  the  poor  the  idea  that 
it  is  disgraceful  to  receive  ;  and  are  likely,  without  much  dif- 
ficulty, to  succeed  in  persuading  not  a  few  of  the  rich  that  it 
is  disgraceful  to  give.  But  the  political  economy  of  a  great 
state  makes  both  giving  and  receiving  graceful ;  and  the  po- 
litical economy  of  true  religion  interprets  the  saying  that  "  it 
is  more  blessed  to  give  than  to  receive,"  not  as  the  promise  of 
reward  in  another  life  for  mortified  selfishness  in  this,  but  as 
pledge  of  bestowal  upon  us  of  that  sweet  and  better  nature, 
which  does  not  mortify  itself  in  giving.] 

Brantwood,  Conision^ 
m  October,  1871. 


*hk  ism 


PRE-RAPHAELITISM 


FRANCIS  HAWKSWORTH  FAWKES,  ESQ. 

OF  FARNLEY 

THESE  PAGES 

WHICH  OWE  THEIR  PRESENT  FORM  TO  ADVANTAGES  GRANTED 
BY  HIS  KINDNESS 
ARE  AFFECTIONATELY  INSCRIBED 
BY  HIS  OBLIGED  FRIEND 
JOHN  RUSKIN 


PEEFAOE. 


Eight  years  ago,  in  the  close  of  the  first  volume  of  "  Mod- 
ern Painters,"  I  ventured  to  give  the  following  advice  to  the 
young  artists  of  England  : — 

"  They  should  go  to  nature  in  all  singleness  of  heart,  and 
walk  with  her  laboriously  and  trustingly,  having  no  other 
thought  but  how  best  to  penetrate  her  meaning ;  rejecting 
nothing,  selecting  nothing,  and  scorning  nothing."  Advice 
which,  whether  bad  or  good,  involved  infinite  labor  and 
humiliation  in  the  following  it ;  and  was  therefore,  for  the 
most  part,  rejected. 

It  has,  however,  at  last  been  carried  out,  to  the  very  letter, 
by  a  group  of  men  who,  for  their  reward,  have  been  assailed 
with  the  most  scurrilous  abuse  which  I  ever  recollect  seeing 
issue  from  the  public  press.  I  have,  therefore,  thought  it  due 
to  them  to  contradict  the  directly  false  statements  which  have 
been  made  respecting  their  works  ;  and  to  point  out  the  kind 
of  merit  which,  however  deficient  in  some  respects,  those 
works  possess  beyond  the  possibility  of  dispute, 

Denmark  Hill, 
Aug.  1851. 


PRE-RAPHAELITISM. 


It  may  be  proved,  with  much  certainty,  that  God  intends 
no  man  to  live  in  this  world  without  working  :  but  it  seems  to 
me  no  less  evident  that  He  intends  every  man  to  be  happy  in 
his  work.  It  is  written,  "  in  the  sweat  of  thy  brow,"  but  it 
was  never  written,  "  in  the  breaking  of  thine  heart/'  thou 
shalt  eat  bread ;  and  I  find  that,  as  on  the  one  hand,  infinite 
misery  is  caused  by  idle  people,  who  both  fail  in  doing  what 
was  appointed  for  them  to  do,  and  set  in  motion  various 
springs  of  mischief  in  matters  in  which  they  should  have  had 
no  concern,  so  on  the  other  hand,  no  small  misery  is  caused 
by  over-worked  and  unhappy  people,  in  the  dark  views  which 
they  necessarily  take  up  themselves,  and  force  upon  others,  of 
work  itself.  Were  it  not  so,  I  believe  the  fact  of  their  being 
unhappy  is  in  itself  a  violation  of  divine  law,  and  a  sign  of 
some  kind  of  folly  or  sin  in  their  way  of  life.  Now  in  order 
that  people  may  be  happy  in  their  work,  these  three  things 
are  needed  :  They  must  be  fit  for  it :  They  must  not  do  too 
much  of  it :  and  they  must  have  a  sense  of  success  in  it — not 
a  doubtful  sense,  such  as  needs  some  testimony  of  other  peo- 
ple for  its  confirmation,  but  a  sure  sense,  or  rather  knowledge, 
that  so  much  work  has  been  done  well,  and  fruitfully  done, 
whatever  the  world  may  say  or  think  about  it.  So  that  in 
order  that  a  man  may  be  happy,  it  is  necessary  that  he  should 
not  only  be  capable  of  his  work,  but  a  good  judge  of  his 
work. 

The  first  thing  then  that  he  has  to  do,  if  unhappily  his 
parents  or  masters  have  not  done  it  for  him,  is  to  find  out 
what  he  is  fit  for.  In  which  inquiry  a  man  may  be  very  safely 
guided  by  his  likings,  if  he  be  not  also  guided  by  his  pride. 


238 


PRE-RAPHAELITISM. 


People  usually  reason  in  some  such  fashion  as  this  :  "I  don't 

seem  quite  fit  for  a  head-manager  in  the  firm  of  &  Co., 

therefore,  in  all  probability,  I  am  fit  to  be  Chancellor  of  the 
Exchequer."    Whereas,  they  ought  rather  to  reason  thus  :  "  I 

don't  seem  quite  fit  to  be  head-manager  in  the  firm  of  

&  Co.,  but  I  daresay  I  might  do  something  in  a  small  green- 
grocery business  ;  I  used  to  be  a  good  judge  of  peas  ; "  that 
is  to  say,  always  trying  lower  instead  of  trying  higher,  until 
they  find  bottom  :  once  well  set  on  the  ground,  a  man  may 
build  up  by  degrees,  safely,  instead  of  disturbing  every  one 
in  his  neighborhood  by  perpetual  catastrophes.  But  this  kind 
of  humility  is  rendered  especially  difficult  in  these  days,  by 
the  contumely  thrown  on  men  in  humble  employments.  The 
very  removal  of  the  massy  bars  which  once  separated  one 
class  of  society  from  another,  has  rendered  it  tenfold  more 
shameful  in  foolish  people's,  i.  e.  in  most  people's  eyes,  to  re- 
main in  the  lower  grades  of  it,  than  ever  it  was  before.  When 
a  man  born  of  an  artisan  was  looked  upon  as  an  entirely  dif- 
ferent species  of  animal  from  a  man  born  of  a  noble,  it  made 
him  no  more  uncomfortable  or  ashamed  to  remain  that  differ- 
ent species  of  animal,  than  it  makes  a  horse  ashamed  to  re- 
main a  horse,  and  not  to  become  a  giraffe.  But  now  that  a 
man  may  make  money,  and  rise  in  the  world,  and  associate 
himself,  unreproached,  with  people  once  far  above  him,  not 
only  is  the  natural  discontentedness  of  humanity  developed  to 
an  unheard-of  extent,  whatever  a  man's  position,  but  it  be- 
comes a  veritable  shame  to  him  to  remain  in  the  state  he  was 
born  in,  and  everybody  thinks  it  his  duty  to  try  to  be  a  "gen- 
tleman." Persons  who  have  any  influence  in  the  management 
of  public  institutions  for  charitable  education  know  how  com- 
mon this  feeling  has  become.  Hardly  a  day  passes  but  they 
receive  letters  from  mothers  who  want  all  their  six  or  eight 
sons  to  go  to  college,  and  make  the  grand  tour  in  the  long 
vacation,  and  who  think  there  is  something  wrong  in  the 
foundations  of  society,  because  this  is  not  possible.  Out  of 
every  ten  letters  of  this  kind,  nine  will  allege,  as  the  reason 
of  the  writers'  importunity,  their  desire  to  keep  their  families 
in  such  and  such  a  "  station  of  life."    There  is  no  real  desire 


PRE- RAPE AELITISM. 


239 


for  the  safety,  the  discipline,  or  the  moral  good  of  the  chil- 
dren, only  a  panic  horror  of  the  inexpressibly  pitiable  calamity 
of  their  living  a  ledge  or  two  lower  on  the  molehill  of  the 
world — a  calamity  to  be  averted  at  any  cost  whatever,  of  strug- 
gle, anxiety,  and  shortening  of  life  itself.  I  do  not  believe 
that  any  greater  good  could  be  achieved  for  the  country,  than 
the  change  in  public  feeling  on  this  head,  which  might  be 
brought  about  by  a  few  benevolent  men,  undeniably  in  the 
class  of  "  gentlemen,"  who  would,  on  principle,  enter  into  some 
of  our  commonest  trades,  and  make  them  honorable ;  showing 
that  it  was  possible  for  a  man  to  retain  his  dignity,  and  re- 
main, in  the  best  sense,  a  gentleman,  though  part  of  his  time 
was  every  day  occupied  in  manual  labor,  or  even  in  serving 
customers  over  a  counter.  I  do  not  in  the  least  see  why  cour- 
tesy, and  gravity,  and  sympathy  with  the  feelings  of  others, 
and  courage,  and  truth,  and  piety,  and  what  else  goes  to  make 
up  a  gentleman's  character,  should  not  be  found  behind  a 
counter  as  well  as  elsewhere,  if  they  were  demanded,  or  even 
hoped  for,  there. 

Let  us  suppose,  then,  that  the  man's  way  of  life  and  man- 
ner of  work  have  been  discreetly  chosen  ;  then  the  next  thing 
to  be  required  is,  that  he  do  not  over-work  himself  therein.  I 
am  not  going  to  say  anything  here  about  the  various  errors  in 
our  systems  of  society  and  commerce,  which  appear  (I  am  not 
sure  if  they  ever  do  more  than  appear)  to  force  us  to  over- 
work ourselves  merely  that  we  may  live  ;  nor  about  the  still 
more  fruitful  cause  of  unhealthy  toil — the  incapability,  in 
many  men,  of  being  content  with  the  little  that  is  indeed 
necessary  to  their  happiness.  I  have  only  a  word  or  two  to 
say  about  one  special  cause  of  over-work — the  ambitious 
desire  of  doing  great  or  clever  things,  and  the  hope  of  accom- 
plishing them  by  immense  efforts  :  hope  as  vain  as  it  is  per- 
nicious ;  not  only  making  men  over-work  themselves,  but  ren- 
dering all  the  work  they  do  unwholesome  to  them.  I  say  it 
is  a  vain  hope,  and  let  the  reader  be  assured  of  this  (it  is  a 
truth  all-important  to  the  best  interests  of  humanity).  No 
great  intellectual  thing  was  ever  done  by  great  effort ;  a  great 
thing  can  only  be  done  by  a  great  man,  and  he  does  it  without 


240 


PRE-RA  PEA  ELITISM. 


effort.  Nothing  is,  at  present,  less  understood  by  us  than 
this — nothing  is  more  necessary  to  be  understood.  Let  me 
try  to  say  it  as  clearly,  and  explain  it  as  fully  as  I  may. 

I  have  said  no  great  intellectual  thing :  for  I  do  not  mean 
the  assertion  to  extend  to  things  moral.  On  the  contrary,  it 
seems  to  me  that  just  because  we  are  intended,  as  long  as  we 
live,  to  be  in  a  state  of  intense  moral  effort,  we  are  not  in- 
tended to  be  in  intense  physical  or  intellectual  effort.  Our 
full  energies  are  to  be  given  to  the  soul's  work — to  the  great 
fight  with  the  Dragon — the  taking  the  kingdom  of  heaven  by 
force.  But  the  body's  work  and  head's  work  are  to  be  done 
quietly,  and  comparatively  without  effort.  Neither  limbs  nor 
brain  are  ever  to  be  strained  to  their  utmost ;  that  is  not  the 
way  in  which  the  greatest  quantity  of  work  is  to  be  got  out  of 
them  :  they  are  never  to  be  worked  furiously,  but  with  tran- 
quillity and  constancy.  We  are  to  follow  the  plough  from 
sunrise  to  sunset,  but  not  to  pull  in  race-boats  at  the  twilight : 
we  shall  get  no  fruit  of  that  kind  of  work,  only  disease  of  the 
heart. 

How  many  pangs  would  be  spared  to  thousands,  if  this 
great  truth  and  law  were  but  once  sincerely,  humbly  under- 
stood,— that  if  a  great  thing  can  be  done  at  all,  it  can  be  done 
easily  ;  that,  when  it  is  needed  to  be  done,  there  is  perhaps 
only  one  man  in  the  world  who  can  do  it ;  but  he  can  do  it 
without  any  trouble — without  more  trouble,  that  is,  than  it 
costs  small  people  to  do  small  things ;  nay,  perhaps,  with  less. 
And  yet  what  truth  lies  more  openly  on  the  surface  of  all 
human  phenomena?  Is  not  the  evidence  of  Ease  on  the  very 
front  of  all  the  greatest  works  in  existence  ?  Do  they  not  say 
plainly  to  us,  not,  1 6  there  has  been  a  great  effort  here,"  but, 
''  there  has  been  a  great  power  here"?  It  is  not  the  weari- 
ness of  mortality,  but  the  strength  of  divinity,  which  we  have 
to  recognise  in  all  mighty  things  ;  and  that  is  just  what  we 
now  never  recognise,  but  think  that  we  are  to  do  great  things, 
by  help  of  iron  bars  and  perspiration  : — alas  !  we  shall  do 
nothing  that  way  but  lose  some  pounds  of  our  own  weight. 

Yet,  let  me  not  be  misunderstood,  nor  this  great  truth  be 
supposed  anywise  resolvable  into  the  favorite  dogma  of  young 


PRE-RAPHAELITISM. 


241 


men,  that  they  need  not  work  if  they  have  genius.  The  fact 
is,  that  a  man  of  genius  is  always  far  more  ready  to  work  than 
other  people,  and  gets  so  much  more  good  from  the  work  that 
he  does,  and  is  often  so  little  conscious  of  the  inherent  divin- 
ity in  himself,  that  he  is  very  apt  to  ascribe  all  his  capacity  to 
his  work,  and  to  tell  those  who  ask  how  he  came  to  be  what 
he  is  :  "  If  I  am  anything,  which  I  much  doubt,  I  made  myself 
so  merely  by  labor."  This  was  Newton's  way  of  talking,  and 
I  suppose  it  would  be  the  general  tone  of  men  whose  genius 
had  been  devoted  to  the  physical  sciences.  Genius  in  the 
Arts  must  commonly  be  more  self-conscious,  but  in  whatever 
field,  it  will  always  be  distinguished  by  its  perpetual,  steady, 
well-directed,  happy,  and  faithful  labor  in  accumulating  and 
disciplining  its  powers,  as  well  as  by  its  gigantic,  incommuni- 
cable facility  in  exercising  them.  Therefore,  literally,  it  is  no 
man's  business  whether  he  has  genius  or  not :  work  he  must, 
whatever  he  is,  but  quietly  and  steadily  ;  and  the  natural  and 
unforced  results  of  such  work  will  be  always  the  things  that 
God  meant  him  to  do,  and  will  be  his  best.  No  agonies  nor 
heart-rendings  will  enable  him  to  do  any  better.  If  he  be  a 
great  man,  they  will  be  great  things  ;  if  a  small  man,  small 
things  ;  but  always,  if  thus  peacefully  done,  good  and  right  ; 
always,  if  restlessly  and  ambitiously  done,  false,  hollow,  and 
despicable. 

Then  the  third  thing  needed  wras,  I  said,  that  a  man  should 
be  a  good  judge  of  his  work  ;  and  this  chiefly  that  he  may  not 
be  dependent  upon  popular  opinion  for  the  manner  of  doing- 
it,  but  also  that  he  may  have  the  just  encouragement  of  the 
sense  of  progress,  and  an  honest  consciousness  of  victory : 
how  else  can  he  become 

"  That  awful  independent  on  to-morrow, 
Whose  yesterdays  look  backwards  with  a  smile." 

I  am  persuaded  that  the  real  nourishment  and  help  of  such  a 
feeling  as  this  is  nearly  unknown  to  half  the  workmen  of  the 
present  day.  For  whatever  appearance  of  self-complacency 
there  may  be  in  their  outward  bearing,  it  is  visible  enough, 


242 


PRE-RAPIlAELniSM. 


by  their  feverish  jealousy  of  each  other,  how  little  confidence 
they  have  in  the  sterling  value  of  their  several  doings.  Con- 
ceit may  puff  a  man  up,  but  never  prop  him  up  ;  and  there  is 
too  visible  distress  and  hopelessness  in  men's  aspects  to  admit 
of  the  supposition  that  they  have  any  stable  support  of  faith 
in  themselves. 

I  have  stated  these  principles  generally,  because  there  is  no 
branch  of  labor  to  which  they  do  not  apply  :  But  there  is  one 
in  which  our  ignorance  or  forgetfulness  of  them  has  caused 
an  incalculable  amount  of  suffering  :  and  I  would  endeavor 
now  to  reconsider  them  with  especial  reference  to  it, — the 
branch  of  the  Arts. 

In  general,  the  men  who  are  employed  in  the  Arts  have 
freely  chosen  their  profession,  and  suppose  themselves  to  have 
special  faculty  for  it ;  yet,  as  a  body,  they  are  not  happy  men. 
For  which  this  seems  to  me  the  reason,  that  they  are  expected, 
and  themselves  expect,  to  make  their  bread  by  being  clever — 
not  by  steady  or  quiet  work  ;  and  are,  therefore,  for  the  most 
part,  trying  to  be  clever,  and  so  living  in  an  utterly  false  state 
of  mind  and  action. 

This  is  the  case,  to  the  same  extent,  in  no  other  profession 
or  employment.  A  lawyer  may  indeed  suspect  that,  unless 
he  has  more  wit  than  those  around  him,  he  is  not  likely  to 
advance  in  his  profession  ;  but  he  will  not  be  always  thinking 
how  he  is  to  display  his  wit.  He  will  generally  understand, 
early  in  his  career,  that  wit  must  be  left  to  take  care  of  itself, 
and  that  it  is  hard  knowledge  of  law  and  vigorous  examination 
and  collation  of  the  facts  of  every  case  entrusted  to  him,  which 
his  clients  will  mainly  demand  ;  this  it  is  which  he  has  to  be 
paid  for ;  and  this  is  healthy  and  measurable  labor,  payable 
by  the  hour.  If  he  happen  to  have  keen  natural  perception 
and  quick  wit,  these  will  come  into  play  in  their  due  time  and 
place,  but  he  will  not  think  of  them  as  his  chief  power  ;  and 
if  he  have  them  not,  he  may  still  hope  that  industry  and  con- 
scientiousness may  enable  him  to  rise  in  his  profession  without 
them.  Again  in  the  case  of  clergymen  :  that  they  are  sorely 
tempted  to  display  their  eloquence  or  wit,  none  who  know 
their  own  hearts  will  deny,  but  then  they  know  this  to  he  a 


PBE-RAPHAELITISM. 


243 


temptation :  they  never  would  suppose  that  cleverness  was  all 
that  was  to  be  expected  from  them,  or  would  sit  down  delib- 
erately to  write  a  clever  sermon :  even  the  dullest  or  vainest 
of  them  would  throw  some  veil  over  their  vanity,  and  pretend 
to  some  profitableness  of  purpose  in  what  they  did.  They 
would  not  openly  ask  of  their  hearers — Did  you  think  my 
sermon  ingenious,  or  my  language  poetical  ?  They  would 
early  understand  that  they  were  not  paid  for  being  ingenious, 
nor  called  to  be  so,  but  to  preach  truth  ;  that  if  they  happened 
to  possess  wit,  eloquence,  or  originality,  these  would  appear 
and  be  of  service  in  due  time,  but  were  not  to  be  continually 
sought  after  or  exhibited  :  and  if  it  should  happen  that  they 
had  them  not,  they  might  still  be  serviceable  pastors  without 
them. 

Not  so  with  the  unhappy  artist.  No  one  expects  any  honest 
or  useful  work  of  him  ;  but  every  one  expects  him  to  be  in- 
genious. Originality,  dexterity,  invention,  imagination,  every 
thing  is  asked  of  him  except  what  alone  is  to  be  had  for  asking 
— honesty  and  sound  work,  and  the  due  discharge  of  his 
function  as  a  painter.  What  function  ?  asks  the  reader  in 
some  surprise.  He  may  well  ask  ;  for  I  suppose  few  painters 
have  any  idea  what  their  function  is,  or  even  that  they  have 
any  at  all. 

And  yet  surely  it  is  not  so  difficult  to  discover.  The  facul- 
ties, which  when  a  man  finds  in  himself,  he  resolves  to  be  a 
painter,  are,  I  suppose,  intenseness  of  observation  and  facility 
of  imitation.  The  man  is  created  an  observer  and  an  imitator ; 
and  his  function  is  to  convey  knowledge  to  his  fellow-men,  of 
such  things  as  cannot  be  taught  otherwise  than  ocularly.  For 
a  long  time  this  function  remained  a  religious  one :  it  was 
to  impress  upon  the  popular  mind  the  reality  of  the  objects  of 
faith,  and  the  truth  of  the  histories  of  Scripture,  by  giving 
visible  form  to  both.  That  function  has  now  passed  away, 
and  none  has  as  yet  taken  its  place.  The  painter  has  no  pro- 
fession, no  purpose.  He  is  an  idler  on  the  earth,  chasing  the 
shadows  of  his  own  fancies. 

But  he  was  never  meant  to  be  this.  The  sudden  and  uni- 
versal Naturalism,  or  inclination  to  copy  ordinary  natura1 


244 


PRE-RA  PHAELITISM. 


objects,  which  manifested  itself  among  the  painters  of  Europe, 
at  the  moment  when  the  invention  of  printing  superseded 
their  legendary  labors,  was  no  false  instinct.  It  was  mis- 
understood and  misapplied,  but  it  came  at  the  right  time,  and 
has  maintained  itself  through  all  kinds  of  abuse  ;  presenting 
in  the  recent  schools  of  landscape,  perhaps  only  the  first  fruits 
of  its  power.  That  instinct  wTas  urging  every  painter  in 
Europe  at  the  same  moment  to  his  true  duty — the  faithful 
representation  of  all  objects  of  historical  interest,  or  of  natural 
beauty  existent  at  the  period;  representations  such  as  might 
at  once  aid  the  advance  of  the  sciences,  and  keep  faithful 
record  of  every  monument  of  past  ages  which  was  likely 
to  be  swept  away  in  the  approaching  eras  of  revolutionary 
change. 

The  instinct  came,  as  I  said,  exactly  at  the  right  moment ; 
and  let  the  reader  consider  what  amount  and  kind  of  general 
knowledge  might  by  this  time  have  been  possessed  by  the 
nations  of  Europe,  had  their  painters  understood  and  obeyed 
it.  Suppose  that,  after  disciplining  themselves  so  as  to  be 
able  to  draw,  with  unerring  precision,  each  the  particular 
kind  of  subject  in  which  he  most  delighted,  they  had  sepa- 
rated into  two  great  armies  of  historians  and  naturalists  ; — 
that  the  first  had  painted  with  absolute  faithfulness  every  edi- 
fice, every  city,  every  battle-field,  every  scene  of  the  slightest 
historical  interest,  precisely  and  completely  rendering  their 
aspect  at  the  time  ;  and  that  their  companions,  according  to 
their  several  powers,  had  painted  with  like  fidelity  the  plants 
and  animals,  the  natural  scenery,  and  the  atmospheric  phe- 
nomena of  every  country  on  the  earth — suppose  that  a  faith- 
ful and  complete  record  were  now  in  our  museums  of  every 
building  destroyed  by  war,  or  time,  or  innovation,  during 
these  last  200  years — suppose  that  each  recess  of  every  moun- 
tain chain  of  Europe  had  been  penetrated,  and  its  rocks 
drawn  with  such  accuracy  that  the  geologist's  diagram  was  no 
longer  necessary— suppose  that  every  tree  of  the  forest  had 
been  drawn  in  its  noblest  aspect,  every  beast  of  the  field  in  its 
savage  life — that  all  these  gatherings  were  already  in  our  nar 
tional  galleries,  and  that  the  painters  of  the  present  day  were 


PRE- HA  PEA  EL  ITISM. 


245 


laboring,  happily  and  earnestly,  to  multiply  them,  and  put 
such  means  of  knowledge  more  and  more  within  reach  of  the 
common  people — would  not  that  be  a  more  honorable  life  for 
them,  than  gaining  precarious  bread  by  "  bright  effects  ? " 
They  think  not,  perhaps.  They  think  it  easy,  and  therefore 
contemptible,  to  be  truthful  ;  they  have  been  taught  so  all 
their  lives.  But  it  is  not  so,  whoever  taught  it  them.  It  is 
most  difficult,  and  worthy  of  the  greatest  men's  greatest  ef- 
fort, to  render,  as  it  should  be  rendered,  the  simplest  of  the 
natural  features  of  the  earth  ;  but  also  be  it  remembered,  no 
man  is  confined  to  the  simplest  ;  each  may  look  out  work  for 
himself  where  he  chooses,  and  it  will  be  strange  if  he  cannot 
find  something  hard  enough  for  him.  The  excuse  is,  however, 
one  of  the  lips  only  ;  for  every  painter  knows  that  when  he 
draws  back  from  the  attempt  to  render  nature  as  she  is,  it  is 
oftener  in  cowardice  than  in  disdain. 

I  must  leave  the  reader  to  pursue  this  subject  for  himself  : 
I  have  not  space  to  suggest  to  him  the  tenth  part  of  the  ad- 
vantages which  would  follow,  both  to  the  painter  from  such 
an  understanding  of  his  mission,  and  to  the  whole  people,  in 
the  results  of  his  labor.  Consider  how  the  man  himself 
would  be  elevated :  how  content  he  would  become,  how 
earnest,  how  full  of  all  accurate  and  noble  knowledge,  how 
free  from  envy — knowing  creation  to  be  infinite,  feeling  at 
once  the  value  of  what  he  did,  and  yet  the  nothingness.  Con- 
sider the  advantage  to  the  people  ;  the  immeasurably  larger 
interest  given  to  art  itself  ;  the  easy,  pleasurable,  and  perfect 
knowledge  conveyed  by  it,  in  every  subject  ;  the  far  greater 
number  of  men  who  might  be  healthily  and  profitably  occu- 
pied with  it  as  a  means  of  livelihood  ;  the  useful  direction  of 
myriads  of  inferior  talents,  now  left  fading  away  in  misery. 
Conceive  all  this,  and  then  look  around  at  our  exhibitions, 
and  behold  the  "  cattle  pieces,"  and  "sea  pieces,"  and  " fruit 
pieces,"  and  "  family  pieces  ; "  the  eternal  brown  cows  in 
ditches,  and  white  sails  in  squalls,  and  sliced  lemons  in  sau- 
cers, and  foolish  faces  in  simpers  ; — and  try  to  feel  what  we 
are,  and  what  we  might  have  been. 

Take  a  single  instance  in  one  branch  of  archaeology.  Let 


PRE-RA  PHA  ELITISM. 


those  who  are  interested  in  the  history  of  religion  consider 
what  a  treasure  we  should  now  have  possessed,  if,  instead  of 
painting  pots,  and  vegetables,  and  drunken  peasantry,  the 
most  accurate  painters  of  the  seventeenth  and  eighteenth  cen- 
turies had  been  set  to  copy,  line  for  line,  the  religious  and 
domestic  sculpture  on  the  German,  Flemish,  and  French  ca- 
thedrals and  castles  ;  and  if  every  building  destroyed  in  the 
French  or  in  any  other  subsequent  revolution,  had  thus  been 
drawn  in  all  its  parts  with  the  same  precision  with  which 
Gerard  Douw  or  Mieris  paint  basreliefs  of  Cupids.  Consider, 
even  now,  what  incalculable  treasure  is  still  left  in  ancient 
basreliefs,  full  of  every  kind  of  legendary  interest,  of  subtle 
expression,  of  priceless  evidence  as  to  the  character,  feelings, 
habits,  histories,  of  past  generations,  in  neglected  and  shat- 
tered churches  and  domestic  buildings,  rapidly  disappearing 
over  the  whole  of  Europe — treasure  which,  once  lost,  the  labor 
of  all  men  living  cannot  bring  back  again  ;  and  then  look  at 
the  myriads  of  men,  with  skill  enough,  if  they  had  but.  the 
commonest  schooling,  to  record  all  this  faithfully,  who  are 
making  their  bread  by  drawing  dances  of  naked  women  from 
academy  models,  or  idealities  of  chivalry  fitted  out  writh 
Wardour  Street  armor,  or  eternal  scenes  from  Gil  Bias,  Don 
Quixote,  and  the  Vicar  of  Wakefield,  or  mountain  sceneries 
with  young  idiots  of  Londoners  wearing  Highland  bonnets 
and  brandishing  rifles  in  the  foregrounds.  Do  but  think  of 
these  things  in  the  breadth  of  their  inexpressible  imbecility, 
and  then  go  and  stand  before  that  broken  basrelief  in  the 
southern  gate  of  Lincoln  Cathedral,  and  see  if  there  is  no 
fibre  of  the  heart  in  you  that  will  break  too. 

But  is  there  to  be  no  place  left,  it  will  be  indignantly  asked, 
for  imagination  and  invention,  for  poetical  power,  or  love  of 
ideal  beauty  ?  Yes  ;  the  highest,  the  noblest  place — that 
which  these  only  can  attain  when  they  are  all  used  in  the 
cause,  and  with  the  aid  of  truth.  Wherever  imagination  and 
sentiment  are,  they  will  either  show  themselves  without  forc- 
ing, or,  if  capable  of  artificial  development,  the  kind  of  train- 
ing which  such  a  school  of  art  would  give  them  would  be  the 
best  they  could  receive.    The  infinite  absurdity  and  failure 


PR  E-  R  A  PHA  EL  II  'ISM. 


247 


of  our  present  training  consists  mainly  in  this,  that  we  do  not 
rank  imagination  and  invention  high  enough,  and  suppose  that 
they  can  be  taught.  Throughout  every  sentence  that  I  ever 
have  written,  the  reader  will  find  the  same  rank  attributed  to 
these  powers, — the  rank  of  a  purely  divine  gift,  not  to  be 
attained,  increased,  or  in  any  wise  modified  by  teaching,  only 
in  various  wa}^s  capable  of  being  concealed  or  quenched.  Un- 
derstand this  thoroughly  ;  know  once  for  all,  that  a  poet  on 
canvas  is  exactly  the  same  species  of  creature  as  a  poet  in 
song,  and  nearly  every  error  in  our  methods  of  teaching  will 
be  done  away  with.  For  who  among  us  now  thinks  of  bring- 
ing men  up  to  be  poets  ? — of  producing  poets  by  any  kind  of 
general  recipe  or  method  of  cultivation  ?  Suppose  even  that 
we  see  in  youth  that  which  we  hope  may,  in  its  development, 
become  a  power  of  this  kind,  should  wTe  instantly,  supposing 
that  we  wanted  to  make  a  poet  of  him,  and  nothing  else,  for- 
bid him  all  quiet,  steady,  rational  labor  ?  Should  we  force 
him  to  perpetual  spinning  of  new  crudities  out  of  his  boyish 
brain,  and  set  before  him,  as  the  only  objects  of  his  study,  the 
laws  of  versification  which  criticism  has  supposed  itself  to  dis- 
cover in  the  works  of  previous  writers  ?  "Whatever  gifts  the 
boy  had,  would  much  be  likely  to  come  of  them  so  treated  ? 
unless,  indeed,  they  wTere  so  great  as  to  break  through  all 
such  snares  of  falsehood  and  vanity,  and  build  their  own  foun- 
dation in  spite  of  us ;  whereas  if,  as  in  cases  numbering  mill- 
ions against  units,  the  natural  gifts  were  too  weak  to  do  this, 
could  any  thing  come  of  such  training  but  utter  inanity  and 
spuriousness  of  the  whole  man  ?  But  if  we  had  sense,  should 
we  not  rather  restrain  and  bridle  the  first  flame  of  invention 
in  early  youth,  heaping  material  on  it  as  one  would  on  the 
first  sparks  and  tongues  of  a  fire  which  we  desired  to  feed  into 
greatness?  Should  we  not  educate  the  whole  intellect  into 
general  strength,  and  all  the  affections  into  warmth  and  hon- 
esty, and  look  to  heaven  for  the  rest  ?  This,  I  say,  we  should 
have  sense  enough  to  do,*  in  order  to  produce  a  poet  in 
words :  but,  it  being  required  to  produce  a  poet  on  canvas, 
what  is  our  way  of  setting  to  work  ?  We  begin,  in  all  proba- 
bility, by  telling  the  youth  of  fifteen  or  sixteen,  that  Nature 


248 


PRK-RAPHA  ELITISM. 


is  full  of  faults,  and  that  he  is  to  improve  her  •  but  that  Raph- 
ael is  perfection,  and  that  the  more  he  copies  Raphael  the 
better  ;  that  after  much  copying  of  Raphael,  he  is  to  try  what 
he  can  do  himself  in  a  Raphaelesque,  but  yet  original,  man- 
ner :  that  is  to  say,  he  is  to  try  to  do  something  very  clever, 
all  out  of  his  own  head,  but  yet  this  clever  something  is  to 
be  properly  subjected  to  Raphaelesque  rules,  is  to  have  a 
principal  light  occupying  one-seventh  of  its  space,  and  a  prin- 
ciple shadow  occupying  one-third  of  the  same  ;  that  no  two 
people's  heads  in  the  picture  are  to  be  turned  the  same  way, 
and  that  all  the  personages  represented  are  to  possess  ideal 
beauty  of  the  highest  order,  which  ideal  beauty  consists  partly 
in  a  Greek  outline  of  nose,  partly  in  proportions  expressible 
in  decimal  fractions  between  the  lips  and  chin  ;  but  partly 
also  in  that  degree  of  improvement  which  the  youth  of  sixteen 
is  to  bestow  upon  God's  work  in  general.  This  I  say  is  the 
kind  of  teaching  which  through  various  channels,  Royal  Acad- 
emy lecturings,  press  criticisms,  public  enthusiasm,  and  not 
least  by  solid  weight  of  gold,  we  give  to  our  young  men.  And 
we  wonder  we  have  no  painters ! 

But  we  do  worse  than  this.  Within  the  last  few  years  some 
sense  of  the  real  tendency  of  such  teaching  has  appeared  in 
some  of  our  youuger  painters.  It  only  could  appear  in  the 
younger  ones,  our  older  men  having  become  familiarised  with 
the  false  system,  or  else  having  passed  through  it  and  forgotten 
it,  not  well  knowing  the  degree  of  harm  they  had  sustained. 
This  sense  appeared,  among  our  youths, — increased,- -matured 
into  resolute  action.  Necessarily,  to  exist  at  all,  it  needed  the 
support  both  of  strong  instincts  and  of  considerable  self-con- 
fidence, otherwise  it  must  at  once  have  been  borne  down  by 
the  weight  of  general  authority  and  received  canon  law.  Strong 
instincts  are  apt  to  make  men  strange,  and  rude  ;  self-confi- 
dence, however  well  founded,  to  give  much  of  what  they  do 
or  say  the  appearance  of  impertinence.  Look  at  the  self-con- 
fidence of  Wordsworth,  stiffening  every  other  sentence  of  his 
prefaces  into  defiance  ;  there  is  no  more  of  it  than  was  needed 
to  enable  him  to  do  his  work,  yet  it  is  not  a  little  ungraceful 
here  and  there.    Suppose  this  stubbornness  and  self-trust  in 


PRE-RA  PHA  EL  ITISM. 


249 


a  youth,  laboring  in  an  art  of  which  the  executive  part  is  con- 
fessedly to  be  best  learnt  from  masters,  and  we  shall  hardly 
wonder  that  much  of  his  work  has  a  certain  awkwardness  and 
stiffness  in  it,  or  that  he  should  be  regarded  with  disfavor  by 
many,  even  the  most  temperate,  of  the  judges  trained  in  the 
system  he  was  breaking  through,  and  with  utter  contempt  and 
reprobation  by  the  envious  and  the  dull.  Consider,  farther, 
that  the  particular  system  to  be  overthrown  was,  in  the  present 
case,  one  of  which  the  main  characteristic  was  the  pursuit  of 
beauty  at  the  expense  of  manliness  and  truth  ;  and  it  will 
seem  likely,  a  priori,  that  the  men  intended  successfully  to 
resist  the  influence  of  such  a  system  should  be  endowed  with 
little  natural  sense  of  beauty,  and  thus  rendered  dead  to  the 
temptation  it  presented.  Summing  up  these  conditions,  there 
is  surely  little  cause  for  surprise  that  pictures  painted,  in  a 
temper  of  resistance,  by  exceedingly  young  men,  of  stubborn 
instincts  and  positive  self-trust,  and  with  little  natural  per- 
ception of  beauty,  should  not  be  calculated,  at  the  first  glance, 
to  win  us  from  works  enriched  by  plagiarism,  polished  by 
convention,  invested  with  all  the  attractiveness  of  artificial 
grace,  and  recommended  to  our  respect  by  established 
authority. 

We  should,  however,  on  the  other  hand,  have  anticipated, 
that  in  proportion  to  the  strength  of  character  required  for 
the  effort,  and  to  the  absence  of  distracting  sentiments, 
whether  respect  for  precedent,  or  affection  for  ideal  beauty, 
would  be  the  energy  exhibited  in  the  pursuit  of  the  special 
objects  which  the  youths  proposed  to  themselves,  and  their 
success  in  attaining  them. 

All  this  has  actually  been  the  case,  but  in  a  degree  which 
it  would  have  been  impossible  to  anticipate.  That  two  youths, 
of  the  respective  ages  of  eighteen  and  twenty,  should  have 
conceived  for  themselves  a  totally  independent  and  sincere 
method  of  study,  and  enthusiastically  persevered  in  it  against 
every  kind  of  dissuasion  and  opposition,  is  strange  enough : 
that  in  the  third  or  fourth  year  of  their  efforts  they  should 
have  produced  works  in  many  parts  not  inferior  to  the  best 
of  Albert  Durer,  this  is  perhaps  not  lc*;s  strange.    But  the 


250 


PR  E-  EA  PIIA  EL  IT  IS AT. 


loudness  and  universality  of  the  howl  which  the  common 
critics  of  the  press  have  raised  against  them,  the  utter  absence 
of  all  generous  help  or  encouragement  from  those  who  can 
both  measure  their  toil  and  appreciate  their  success,  and  the 
shrill,  shallow  laughter  of  those  who  can  do  neither  the  one 
nor  the  other, — these  are  strangest  of  all — unimaginable  un- 
less they  had  been  experienced. 

And  as  if  these  were  not  enough,  private  malice  is  at  work 
against  them,  in  its  own  small,  slimy  way.  The  very  day  after 
I  had  written  my  second  letter  to  the  Times  in  the  defence  of 
the  Pre-Kapha elites,  I  received  an  anonymous  letter  respecting 
one  of  them,  from  some  person  apparently  hardly  capable  of 
spelling,  and  about  as  vile  a  specimen  of  petty  malignity  as 
ever  blotted  paper.  I  think  it  wTeli  that  the  public  should 
know  this,  and  so  get  some  insight  into  the  sources  of  the 
spirit  which  is  at  work  against  these  men— how  first  roused  it 
is  difficult  to  say,  for  one  would  hardly  have  thought  that 
mere  eccentricity  in  young  artists  could  have  excited  an  hos- 
tility so  determined  and  so  cruel ; — hostility  which  hesitated 
at  no  assertion,  however  impudent.  That  of  the  "  absence  of 
perspective  "  was  one  of  the  most  curious  pieces  of  the  hue 
and  cry  which  began  with  the  Times,  and  died  away  in  feeble 
maundering  in  the  Art  Union  ;  I  contradicted  it  in  the  Times 
— I  here  contradict  it  directly  for  the  second  time.  There 
was  not  a  single  error  in  perspective  in  three  out  of  the  four 
pictures  in  question.  But  if  otherwise,  would  it  have  been 
anything  remarkable  in  them?  I  doubt,  if  with  the  exception 
of  the  pictures  of  David  Roberts,  there  were  one  architectural 
drawing  in  perspective  on  the  walls  of  the  Academy  ;  I  never 
met  but  with  two  men  in  my  life  who  knew  enough  of  per- 
spective to  draw  a  Gothic  arch  in  a  retiring  plane,  so  that  its 
lateral  dimensions  and  curvatures  might  be  calculated  to  scale 
from  the  drawing.  Our  architects  certainly  do  not,  and  it  was 
but  the  other  day  that,  talking  to  one  of  the  most  distinguished 
among  them,  the  author  of  several  most  valuable  works,  I 
found  he  actually  did  not  know  how  to  draw  a  circle  in  per- 
spective. And  in  this  state  of  general  science  our  writers  for 
the  press  take  it  upon  them  to  tell  us,  that  the  forest  trees 


PRE-RA  PEA  ELITISM. 


251 


in  Mr.  Hunt's  Sylvia,  and  the  bunches  of  lilies  in  Mr.  Collins's 
Convent  Thoughts,  are  out  of  perspective.* 

It  might  not,  I  think,  in  such  circumstances,  have  been  un- 
graceful or  unwise  in  the  Academicians  themselves  to  have 
defended  their  young  pupils,  at  least  by  the  contradiction  of 
statements  directly  false  respecting  them,f  and  the  direction 

*  It  was  not  a  little  curious,  tliat  in  the  very  number  of  the  Art  Union 
which  repeated  this  direct  falsehood  about  the  Pre-Raphaelite  rejection 
of  " linear  perspective"  (by-the-bye,  the  next  time  J.  B.  takes  upon 
him  to  speak  of  anyone  connected  with  the  Universities,  he  may  as  well 
first  ascertain  the  difference  between  a  Graduate  and  an  Under-Grad- 
uate),  the  second  plate  given  should  have  been  of  a  picture  of  Boning- 
ton's,— a  professional  landscape  painter,  observe, — for  the  want  of  aerial 
perspective  in  which  the  Art  Union  itself  was  obliged  to  apologise,  and 
in  which  the  artist  has  committed  nearly  as  many  blunders  in  linear  per- 
spective as  there  are  lines  in  the  picture. 

\  These  false  statements  may  be  reduced  to  three  principal  heads,  and 
directly  contradicted  in  succession. 

The  first,  the  current  fallacy  of  society  as  well  as  of  the  press,  was, 
that  the  Pre-Raphaelites imitated  the  errors  of  early  painters. 

A  falsehood  of  this  kind  could  not  have  obtained  credence  anywhere 
but  in  England,  few  English  people,  comparatively,  having  ever  seen  a 
picture  of  early  Italian  Masters.  If  they  had,  they  would  have  known 
that  the  Pre-Raphaelite  pictures  are  just  as  superior  to  the  early  Italian 
in  skill  of  manipulation,  power  of  drawing,  and  knowledge  of  effect,  as 
inferior  to  them  in  grace  of  design  ;  and  that  in  a  word,  there  is  not  a 
shadow  of  resemblance  between  the  two  styles.  The  Pre-Raphaelites 
imitate  no  pictures :  they  paint  from  nature  only.  But  they  have  op- 
posed themselves  as  a  body  to  that  kind  of  teaching  above  described, 
which  only  began  after  Raphael's  time  :  and  they  have  opposed  them- 
selves as  sternly  to  the  entire  feeling  of  the  Renaissance  schools  ;  a  feel- 
ing compounded  of  indolence,  infidelity,  sensuality,  and  shallow  pride. 
Therefore  they  have  called  themselves  Pre-Raphaelites.  If  they  adhere 
to  their  principles,  and  paint  nature  as  it  is  around  them,  with  the  help 
of  modern  science,  with  the  earnestness  of  the  men  of  the  thirteenth 
and  fourteenth  centuries,  they  will,  as  I  said,  found  a  new  and  noble 
school  in  England.  If  their  sympathies  with  the  early  artists  lead  them 
into  medievalism  or  Romanism,  they  will  of  course  come  to  nothing. 
But  I  believe  there  is  no  danger  of  this,  at  least  for  the  strongest  among 
them.  There  may  be  some  weak  ones,  whom  the  Tractarian  heresies 
may  touch  ;  but  if  so,  they  will  drop  off  like  decayed  branches  from  a 
strong  stem.    I  hope  all  things  from  the  school. 

The  second  falsehood  was,  that  the  Pre-Raphaelites  did  not  draw 


252 


PRE-11APIIAELIT1SM. 


of  the  mind  and  sight  of  the  public  to  such  real  merit  as  the} 
possess.  If  Sir  Charles  Eastlake,  Mulready,  Edwin  and  Charles 
Landseer,  Cope,  and  Dyce  would  each  of  them  simply  state 
their  own  private  opinion  respecting  their  paintings,  sign  it, 
and  publish  it,  I  believe  the  act  would  be  of  more  service  to 
English  art  than  any  thing  the  Academy  has  done  since  it  was 
founded.  But  as  I  cannot  hope  for  this,  I  can  only  ask  the 
public  to  give  their  pictures  careful  examination,  and  look  at 
them  at  once  with  the  indulgence  and  the  respect  which  I 
have  endeavored  to  show  they  deserve. 

Yet  let  me  not  be  misunderstood.  I  have  adduced  them 
only  as  examples  of  the  kind  of  study  which  I  would  desire  to 
see  substituted  for  that  of  our  modern  schools,  and  of  sin- 
gular success  in  certain  characters,  finish  of  detail,  and  bril- 
liancy of  color.  What  faculties,  higher  than  imitative,  may 
be  in  these  men,  I  do  not  yet  venture  to  say  ;  but  I  do  say, 
that  if  they  exist,  such  faculties  will  manifest  themselves  in 
due  time  all  the  more  forcibly  because  they  have  received 
training  so  severe. 

For  it  is  always  to  be  remembered  that  no  one  mind  is  like 
another,  either  in  its  powers  or  perceptions ;  and  while  the 
main  principles  of  training  must  be  the  same  for  all,  the  result 
in  each  will  be  as  various  as  the  kinds  of  truth  which  each  will 
apprehend  ;  therefore,  also,  the  modes  of  effort,  even  in  men 
whose  inner  principles  and  final  aims  are  exactly  the  same. 
Suppose,  for  instance,  two  men,  equally  honest,  equally  indus- 
trious, equally  impressed  with  a  humble  desire  to  render  some 
part  of  what  they  saw  in  nature  faithfully  ;  and,  otherwise, 
trained  in  convictions  such  as  I  have  above  endeavored  to  in- 
duce. But  one  of  them  is  quiet  in  temperament,  has  a  feeble 
memory,  no  invention,  and  excessively  keen  sight.  The  other 
is  impatient  in  temperament,  has  a  memory  which  nothing 

well.  This  was  assertsd,  and  could  have  been  asserted  only  by  persons 
who  had  never  looked  at  the  pictures. 

The  third  falsehood  was,  that  they  had  no  system  of  light  and  shade, 
To  which  it  may  be  simply  replied  that  their  system  of  light  and  shade 
is  exactly  the  same  as  the  Sun's  ;  which  is,  I  believe,  likely  to  outlast 
that  of  the  Renaissance,  however  brilliant. 


PRE-RA  PHA  ELITISM. 


253 


escapes,  an  invention  which  never  rests,  and  is  comparatively 
near-sighted. 

Set  them  both  free  in  the  same  field  in  a  mountain  valley. 
One  sees  everything,  small  and  large,  with  almost  the  same 
clearness ;  mountains  and  grasshoppers  alike  ;  the  leaves  on 
the  branches,  the  veins  in  the  pebbles,  the  bubbles  in  the 
stream  :  but  he  can  remember  nothing,  and  invent  nothing. 
Patiently  he  sets  himself  to  his  mighty  task  ;  abandoning  at 
once  all  thoughts  of  seizing  transient  effects,  or  giving  general 
impressions  of  that  which  his  eyes  present  to  him  in  micro- 
scopical dissection,  he  chooses  some  small  portion  out  of  the 
infinite  scene,  and  calculates  with  courage  the  number  of 
weeks  which  must  elapse  before  he  can  do  justice  to  the  in- 
tensity of  his  perceptions,  or  the  fulness  of  matter  in  his 
subject. 

Meantime,  the  other  has  been  watching  the  change  of  the 
clouds,  and  the  march  of  the  light  along  the  mountain  sides  ; 
he  beholds  the  entire  scene  in  broad,  soft  masses  of  true  gra- 
dation, and  the  very  feebleness  of  his  sight  is  in  some  sort  an 
advantage  to  him,  in  making  him  more  sensible  of  the  aerial 
mystery  of  distance,  and  hiding  from  him  the  multitudes  of 
circumstances  which  it  would  have  been  impossible  for  him  to 
represent.  But  there  is  not  one  change  in  the  casting  of  the 
jagged  shadows  along  the  hollows  of  the  hills,  but  it  is  fixed 
on  his  mind  for  ever  ;  not  a  flake  of  spray  has  broken  from 
the  sea  of  cloud  about  their  bases,  but  he  has  watched  it  as  it 
melts  away,  and  could  recall  it  to  its  lost  place  in  heaven  by 
the  slightest  effort  of  his  thoughts.  Not  only  so,  but  thou- 
sands and  thousands  of  such  images,  of  older  scenes,  remain 
congregated  in  his  mind,  each  mingling  in  new  associations 
with  those  now  visibly  passing  before  him,  and  these  again 
confused  with  other  images  of  his  own  ceaseless,  sleepless 
imagination,  flashing  by  in  sudden  troops.  Fancy  how  his 
paper  will  be  covered  with  stray  symbols  and  blots,  and  un- 
decipherable short-hand  : — as  for  his  sitting  down  to  "  draw 
from  Nature,"  there  was  not  one  of  the  things  which  he 
wished  to  represent  that  stayed  for  so  much  as  five  seconds 
together :  but  none  of  them  escaped,  for  all  that :  they  are 


254 


PHE-RA  PHAELITISM. 


sealed  up  in  that  strange  storehouse  of  his  ;  he  may  take  one 
of  them  out,  perhaps,  this  day  twenty  years,  and  paint  it  in 
his  dark  room,  far  away.  Now,  observe,  you  may  tell  both  of 
these  men,  when  they  are  young,  that  they  are  to  be  honest, 
that  they  have  an  important  function,  and  that  they  are  not 
to  care  what  Raphael  did.  This  you  may  wholesomely  im- 
press on  them  both.  But  fancy  the  exquisite  absurdity  of 
expecting  either  of  them  to  possess  any  of  the  qualities  of  the 
other. 

I  have  supposed  the  feebleness  of  sight  in  the  last,  and  of 
invention  in  the  first  painter,  that  the  contrast  between  them 
might  be  more  striking  ;  but,  with  very  slight  modification, 
both  the  characters  are  real.  Grant  to  the  first  considerable 
inventive  power,  with  exquisite  sense  of  color  ;  and  give  to 
the  second,  in  addition  to  all  his  other  faculties,  the  eye  of  an 
eagle  ;  and  the  first  is  John  Everett  Millais,  the  second 
Joseph  Mallard  William  Turner. 

They  are  among  the  few  men  who  have  defied  all  false 
teaching,  and  have,  therefore,  in  great  measure,  done  justice 
to  the  gifts  with  which  they  were  entrusted.  They  stand  at 
opposite  poles,  marking  culminating  points  of  art  in  both 
directions ;  between  them,  or  in  various  relations  to  them,  we 
may  class  five  or  six  more  living  artists  who,  in  like  manner, 
have  done  justice  to  their  powers.  I  trust  that  I  may  be 
pardoned  for  naming  them,  in  order  that  the  reader  may 
know  how  the  strong  innate  genius  in  each  has  been  inva- 
riably acccompanied  with  the  same  humility,  earnestness,  and 
industry  in  study. 

It  is  hardly  necessary  to  point  out  the  earnestness  or  humil- 
ity in  the  works  of  "William  Hunt ;  but  it  may  be  so  to  sug- 
gest the  high  value  they  possess  as  records  of  English  rural 
life,  and  stilt  life.  Who  is  there  who  for  a  moment  could 
contend  with  him  in  the  unaffected,  yet  humorous  truth  with 
which  he  has  painted  our  peasant  children  ?  Who  is  there 
who  does  not  sympathize  with  him  in  the  simple  love  with 
which  he  dwells  on  the  brightness  and  hlooni  of  our  summer 
fruit  and  flowers  ?  And  yet  there  is  something  to  be  regretted 
concerning  him  :  why  should  he  be  allowed  continually  to 


PRE-RAPIIAEL1TISM. 


255 


paint  the  same  bunches  of  hot-house  grapes,  and  supply  to 
the  Water  Color  Society  a  succession  of  pineapples  with  the 
regularity  of  a  Covent  Garden  fruiterer  ?  He  has  of  late  dis- 
covered that  primrose  banks  are  lovely  ;  but  there  are 
other  things  grow  wild  besides  primroses  :  what  undreamt-of 
loveliness  might  he  not  bring  back  to  us,  if  he  would  lose 
himself  for  a  summer  in  Highland  foregrounds  ;  if  he 
would  paint  the  heather  as  it  grows,  and  the  foxglove  and  the 
harebell  as  they  nestle  in  the  clefts  of  the  rocks,  and  the 
mosses  and  bright  lichens  of  the  rocks  themselves.  And 
then,  cross  to  the  Jura,  and  bring  back  a  piece  of  Jura  pasture 
in  spring ;  with  the  gentians  in  their  earliest  blue,  and  the 
soldanelle  beside  the  fading  snow  !  And  return  again,  and 
paint  a  gray  wall  of  Alpine  crag,  with  budding  roses  crown- 
ing it  like  a  wreath  of  rubies.  That  is  what  he  was  meant  to 
do  in  this  world  ;  not  to  paint  bouquets  in  china  vases. 

I  have  in  various  other  places  expressed  my  sincere  respect 
for  the  works  of  Samuel  Prout :  his  shortness  of  sight  has 
necessarily  prevented  their  possessing  delicacy  of  finish  or 
fulness  of  minor  detail ;  but  I  think  that  those  of  no  other 
living  artist  furnish  an  example  so  striking  of  innate  and 
special  instinct,  sent  to  do  a  particular  work  at  the  exact  and 
only  period  when  it  was  possible.  At  the  instant  when  peace 
had  been  established  all  over  Europe,  but  when  neither 
national  character  nor  national  architecture  had  as  yet  been 
seriously  changed  by  promiscuous  intercourse  or  modern 
"  improvement ; "  when,  however,  nearly  every  ancient  and 
beautiful  building  had  been  long  left  in  a  state  of  compara- 
tive neglect,  so  that  its  aspect  of  partial  ruinousness,  and  of 
separation  from  recent  active  life,  gave  to  every  edifice  a 
peculiar  interest — half  sorrowful,  half  sublime  ; — at  that  mo- 
ment Prout  was  trained  among  the  rough  rocks  and  simple 
cottages  of  Cornwall,  until  his  eye  was  accustomed  to  follow 
with  delight  the  rents  and  breaks,  and  irregularities  which, 
to  another  man,  would  have  been  offensive  ;  and  then,  gifted 
with  infinite  readiness  in  composition,  but  also  with  infinite 
affection  for  the  kind  of  subjects  he  had  to  portray,  he  was 
sent  to  preserve,  in  an  almost  innumerable  series  of  drawings, 


256 


PEER  A  PHA  ELITISM* 


every  one  made  on  the  spot,  the  aspect  borne,  at  the  beginning 
of  the  nineteenth  century,  by  cities  which,  in  a  few  years  more, 
rekindled  wars,  or  unexpected  prosperities,  were  to  ravage,  or 
renovate,  into  nothingness. 

It  seems  strange  to  pass  from  Prout  to  John  Lewis ;  but 
there  is  this  fellowship  between  them,  that  both  seem  to  have 
been  intended  to  appreciate  the  characters  of  foreign  coun- 
tries more  than  of  their  own — nay,  to  have  been  born  in  Eng- 
land chiefly  that  the  excitement  of  strangeness  might  enhance 
to  them  the  interest  of  the  scenes  they  had  to  represent.  I 
believe  John  Lewis  to  have  done  more  entire  justice  to  all 
his  powers  (and  they  are  magnificent  ones)  than  any  other 
man  amongst  us.  His  mission  was  evidently  to  portray  the 
comparatively  animal  life  of  the  southern  and  eastern  families 
of  mankind.  For  this  he  was  prepared  in  a  somewhat  singu- 
lar way— by  being  led  to  study,  and  endowed  with  altogether 
peculiar  apprehension  of,  the  most  sublime  characters  of  ani- 
mals themselves.  Eubens,  Rembrandt,  Snyders,  Tintoret, 
and  Titian,  have  all,  in  various  ways,  drawn  wild  beasts  mag- 
nificently ;  but  they  have  in  some  sort  humanized  or  demon - 
ized  them,  making  them  either  ravenous  fiends  or  educated 
beasts,  that  would  draw  cars,  and  had  respect  for  hermits, 
The  sullen  isolation  of  the  brutal  nature  ;  the  dignity  and 
quietness  of  the  mighty  limbs ;  the  shaggy  mountainous 
power,  mingled  with  grace,  as  of  a  flowing  stream ;  the 
stealthy  restraint  of  strength  and  wrath  in  every  soundless 
motion  of  the  gigantic  frame  ;  all  this  seems  never  to  have 
been  seen,  much  less  drawn,  until  Lewis  drew  and  himself 
engraved  a  series  of  animal  subjects,  now  many  years  ago. 
Since  then,  he  has  devoted  himself  to  the  portraiture  of  those 
European  and  Asiatic  races,  among  whom  the  refinements  of 
civilization  exist  without  its  laws  or  its  energies,  and  in  whom 
the  fierceness,  indolence,  and  subtlety  of  animal  nature  are 
associated  with  brilliant  imagination  and  strong  affections. 
To  this  task  he  has  brought  not  only  intense  perception  of 
the  kind  of  character,  but  powers  of  artistical  composition 
like  those  of  the  great  Venetians,  displaying,  at  the  same 
time,  a  refinement  of  drawing  almost  miraculous,  and  ajopre^ 


PRE- HA  PHAELITISM. 


257 


eiable  only,  as  the  minutise  of  nature  itself  are  appreciable, 
by  the  help  of  the  microscope.  The  value,  therefore,  of  his 
works,  as  records  of  the  aspect  of  the  scenery  and  inhabitants 
of  the  south  of  Spain  and  of  the  East,  in  the  earlier  part  of 
the  nineteenth  century,  is  quite  above  all  estimate. 

I  hardly  know  how  to  speak  of  Mulready  :  in  delicacy  and 
completion  of  drawing,  and  splendor  of  color,  he  takes  place 
beside  John  Lewis  and  the  pre-Raphaelites ;  but  he  has, 
throughout  his  career,  displayed  no  definiteness  in  choice  of 
subject.  He  must  be  named  among  the  painters  who  have 
studied  with  industry,  and  have  made  themselves  great  by 
doing  so  ;  but  having  obtained  a  consummate  method  of  ex- 
ecution, he  has  thrown  it  away  on  subjects  either  altogether 
uninteresting,  or  above  his  powers,  or  unfit  for  pictorial  repre- 
sentation. "The  Cherry  Woman,''  exhibited  in  1850,  may  be 
named  as  an  example  of  the  first  kind;  the  44  Burchell  and 
Sophia  "  of  the  second  (the  character  of  Sir  William  Thorn- 
hill  being  utterly  missed)  ;  the  "  Seven  Ages  "  of  the  third  ; 
for  this  subject  cannot  be  painted.  In  the  written  passage, 
the  thoughts  are  progressive  and  connected  ;  in  the  picture 
they  must  be  co-existent,  and  yet  separate  ;  nor  can  all  the 
characters  of  the  ages  be  rendered  in  painting  at  all.  One 
may  represent  the  soldier  at  the  cannon's  mouth,  but  oue  can- 
not paint  the  "bubble  reputation"  wdiich  he  seeks.  Mul- 
ready, therefore,  wThile  he  has  always  produced  exquisite 
pieces  of  painting,  has  failed  in  doing  anything  which  can  be 
of  true  or  extensive  use.  He  has,  indeed,  understood  how  to 
discipline  his  genius,  but  never  how  to  direct  it. 

EdwTin  Landseer  is  the  last  painter  but  one  whom  I  shall 
name  :  I  need  not  point  out  to  any  one  acquainted  with  his 
earlier  works,  the  labor,  or  watchfulness  of  nature  which  they 
involve,  nor  need  I  do  more  than  allude  to  the  peculiar  facul- 
ties of  his  mind.  It  will  at  once  be  granted  that  the  highest 
merits  of  his  pictures  are  throughout  found  in  those  parts  of 
them  which  are  least  like  what  had  before  been  accomplished ; 
and  that  it  was  not  by  the  study  of  Raphael  that  he  attained 
his  eminent  success,  but  by  a  healthy  love  of  Scotch  terriers. 

None  of  these  painters,  however,  it  will  be  answered,  afford 


PR  E-RA  P1IA  EL  II USM. 


examples  of  the  rise  of  the  highest  imaginative  power  out  of 
close  study  of  matters  of  fact.  Be  it  remembered,  however, 
that  the  imaginative  power,  in  its  magnificence,  is  not  to  be 
found  every  day.  Lewis  has  it  in  no  mean  degree  ;  but  we 
cannot  hope  to  find  it  at  its  highest  more  than  once  in  an  age. 
We  have  had  it  once,  and  must  be  content. 

Towards  the  close  of  the  last  century,  among  the  various 
drawings  executed,  according  to  the  quiet  manner  of  the  time, 
in  greyish  blue,  with  brown  foregrounds,  some  began  to  be 
noticed  as  exhibiting  rather  more  than  ordinary  diligence  and 
delicacy,  signed  W.  Turner.*  There  was  nothing,  however, 
in  them  at  all  indicative  of  genius,  or  even  of  more  than  or- 
dinary talent,  unless  in  some  of  the  subjects  a  large  percep- 
tion of  space,  and  excessive  clearness  and  decision  in  the  ar- 
rangement of  masses.  Gradually  and  cautiously  the  blues 
became  mingled  with  delicate  green,  and  then  with  gold  ;  the 
browns  in  the  foreground  became  first  more  positive,  and 
then  were  slightly  mingled  wTith  other  local  colors  ;  while  the 
touch,  which  had  at  first  been  heavy  and  broken,  like  that  of 
the  ordinary  drawing  masters  of  the  time,  grew  more  and 
more  refined  and  expressive,  until  it  lost  itself  in  a  method  of 
execution  often  too  delicate  for  the  eye  to  follow,  rendering, 
with  a  precision  before  unexampled,  both  the  texture  and  the 
form  of  every  object.  The  style  may  be  considered  as  per- 
fectly formed  about  the  year  1800,  and  it  remained  unchanged 
for  twenty  years. 

During  that  period  the  painter  had  attempted,  and  with 
more  or  less  success  had  rendered,  every  order  of  landscape 
subject,  but  always  on  the  same  principle,  subduing  the  colors 
of  nature  into  a  harmony  of  which  the  key-notes  are  greyish 
green  and  brown  ;  pure  blues  and  delicate  golden  yellows 
being  admitted  in  small  quantity,  as  the  lowest  and  highest 
limits  of  shade  and  light :  and  bright  local  colors  in  extremely 
small  quantity  in  figures  or  other  minor  accessories. 

Pictures  executed  on  such  a  system  are  not,  properly  speak- 

*  He  did  not  use  Ms  full  signature,  J.  M.  Vv7.,  until  about  the  year 
1800. 


PRERAPIIAE  LIT18M. 


ing,  works  in  color  at  all  ;  they  are  studies  of  light  and  shade, 
in  which  both  the  shade  and  the  distance  are  rendered  in  the 
general  hue  which  best  expresses  their  attributes  of  coolness 
and  transparency  ;  and  the  lights  and  the  foreground  are  ex- 
ecuted in  that  which  best  expresses  their  warmth  and  solidity. 
This  advantage  may  just  as  well  be  taken  as  not,  in  studies  of 
light  and  shadow  to  be  executed  with  the  hand  :  but  the  use 
of  two,  three,  or  four  colors,  always  in  the  same  relations  and 
places,  does  not  in  the  least  constitute  the  work  a  study  of 
color,  any  more  than  the  brown  engravings  of  the  Liber  Stu- 
diorum  ;  nor  would  the  idea  of  color  be  in  general  more  pre- 
sent to  the  artist's  mind,  when  he  was  at  work  on  one  of  these 
drawings,  than  when  he  was  using  pure  brown  in  the  mezzo- 
tint engraving.  But  the  idea  of  space,  warmth,  and  freshness 
being  not  successfully  expressible  in  a  single  tint,  and  perfectly 
expressible  by  the  admission  of  three  or  four,  he  allows  him- 
self this  advantage  when  it  is  possible,  without  in  the  least 
embarrassing  himself  with  the  actual  color  of  the  objects  to 
be  represented.  A  stone  in  the  fore  ground  might  in  nature 
have  been  cold  grey,  but  it  will  be  drawn  nevertheless  of  a 
rich  brown,  because  it  is  in  the  foreground  ;  a  hill  in  the  dis- 
tance might  in  nature  be  purple  with  heath,  or  golden  with 
furze  ;  but  it  will  be  drawn  nevertheless  of  a  cool  grey,  because 
it  is  in  the  distance. 

This  at  least  was  the  general  theory, — carried  out  with 
great  severity  in  many,  both  of  the  drawings  and  pictures  ex- 
ecuted by  him  during  the  period  :  in  others  more  or  less 
modified  by  the  cautious  introduction  of  color,  as  the  painter 
felt  his  liberty  increasing  ;  for  the  system  was  evidently  never 
considered  as  final,  or  as  anything  more  than  a  means  of  prog- 
ress :  the  conventional,  easily  manageable  color,  was  visibly 
adopted,  only  that  his  mind  might  be  at  perfect  liberty  to  ad- 
dress itself  to  the  acquirement  of  the  first  and  most  necessary 
knowledge  in  all  art — that  of  form.  But  as  form,  in  landscape, 
implies  vast  bulk  and  space,  the  use  of  the  tints  which  enabled 
him  best  to  express  them,  was  actually  auxiliary  to  the  mere 
drawing  ;  and,  therefore,  not  only  permissible,  but  even  neces- 
sary, while  more  brilliant  or  varied  tints  were  never  indulged 


2G0 


PRE'RAPHlA  ELITISM. 


in,  except  when  they  might  be  introduced  without  the  slight 
est  danger  of  diverting  his  mind  for  an  instant  from  his  prin- 
cipal object.  And,  therefore,  it  will  be  generally  found  in  the 
works  of  this  period,  that  exactly  in  proportion  to  the  impor- 
tance and  general  toil  of  the  composition,  is  the  severity  of 
the  tint ;  and  that  the  play  of  color  begins  to  show  itself  first 
in  slight  and  small  drawings,  where  he  felt  that  he  could  easily 
secure  all  that  he  wanted  in  form. 

Thus  the  "  Crossing  the  Brook,"  and  such  other  elaborate 
and  large  compositions,  are  actually  painted  in  nothing  but 
grey,  brown,  and  blue,  with  a  point  or  two  of  severe  local 
color  in  the  figures  ;  but  in  the  minor  drawings,  tender  pas- 
sages of  complicated  color  occur  not  unfrequently  in  easy 
places  ;  and  even  before  the  year  1800  he  begins  to  introduce 
it  with  evident  joyfulness  and  longing  in  his  rude  and  simple 
studies,  just  as  a  child,  if  it  could  be  supposed  to  govern  itself 
by  a  fully  developed  intellect,  would  cautiously,  but  with  infi- 
nite pleasure,  add  now  and  then  a  tiny  dish  of  fruit  or  other 
dangerous  luxury  to  the  simple  order  of  its  daily  fare.  Thus, 
in  the  foregrounds  of  his  most  severe  drawings,  we  not  unfre- 
quently find  him  indulging  in  the  luxury  of  a  peacock  ;  and  it 
is  impossible  to  express  the  joyfulness  with  which  he  seems  to 
design  its  graceful  form,  and  deepen  with  soft  pencilling  the 
bloom  of  its  blue,  after  he  has  worked  through  the  stern  detail 
of  his  almost  colorless  drawing.  A  rainbow  is  another  of  his 
most  frequently  permitted  indulgences  ;  and  we  find  him  very 
early  allowing  the  edges  of  his  evening  clouds  to  be  touched 
with  soft  rose-color  or  gold  ;  while,  whenever  the  hues  of  nat- 
ure in  anywise  fall  into  his  system,  and  can  be  caught  with- 
out a  dangerous  departure  from  it,  he  instantly  throws  his 
whole  soul  into  the  faithful  rendering  of  them.  Thus  the 
usual  brown  tones  of  his  foreground  become  warmed  into 
sudden  vigor,  and  are  varied  and  enhanced  with  indescribable 
delight,  when  he  finds  himself  by  the  shore  of  a  moorland 
stream,  where  they  truly  express  the  stain  of  its  golden  rocks, 
and  the  darkness  of  its  clear,  Cairngorm-like  pools,  and  the 
usual  serenity  of  his  aerial  blue  is  enriched  into  the  softness 
and  depth  of  the  sapphire,  when  it  can  deepen  the  distant 


PRE-RAPHA  ELITISM. 


261 


slumber  of  some  Highland  lake,  or  temper  the  gloomy  shad- 
ows of  the  evening  upon  its  hills. 

The  system  of  his  color  being  thus  simplified,  he  could  ad- 
dress all  the  strength  of  his  mind  to  the  accumulation  of  facts 
of  form  ;  his  choice  of  subject,  and  his  methods  of  treatment, 
are  therefore  as  various  as  his  color  is  simple  ;  and  it  is  not  a 
little  difficult  to  give  the  reader  who  is  unacquainted  with  his 
works,  an  idea  either  of  their  infinitude  of  aims,  on  the  one 
hand,  or  of  the  kind  of  feeling  which  prevades  them  all,  on 
the  other.  No  subject  was  too  low  or  too  high  for  him  ;  we 
find  him  one  day  hard  at  work  on  a  cock  and  hen,  with  their 
family  of  chickens  in  a  farm-yard  ;  and  bringing  all  the  refine- 
ment of  his  execution  into  play  to  express  the  texture  of  the 
plumage  ;  next  day,  he  is  drawing  the  Dragon  of  Colchis.  One 
hour  he  is  much  interested  in  a  gust  of  wind  blowing  away  an 
old  woman's  cap  ;  the  next  he  is  painting  the  fifth  plague  of 
Egypt.  Every  landscape  painter  before  him  had  acquired 
distinction  by  confining  his  efforts  to  one  class  of  subject. 
Hobbima  painted  oaks ;  Kuysdael,  waterfalls  and  copses ; 
Cuyp,  river  or  meadow  scenes  in  quiet  afternoons  ;  Salvator 
and  Poussin,  such  kind  of  mountain  scenery  as  people  could 
conceive,  who  lived  in  towns  in  the  seventeenth  century.  But 
I  am  well  persuaded  that  if  all  the  works  of  Turner,  up  to  the 
year  1820,  were  divided  into  classes  (as  he  has  himself  divided 
them  in  the  Liber  Studiorum),  no  preponderance  could  be  as- 
signed to  one  class  over  another.  There  is  architecture,  in- 
cluding a  large  number  of  formal  "gentlemen's  seats,''  I  sup- 
pose drawings  commissioned  by  the  owners  ;  then  lowland 
pastoral  scenery  of  every  kind,  including  nearly  all  farming 
operations, — ploughing,  harrowing,  hedging  and  ditching, 
felling  trees,  sheep-washing,  and  I  know  not  what  else  ;  then 
all  kinds  of  town  life — court-yards  of  inns,  starting  of  mail 
coaches,  interiors  of  shops,  house-buildings,  fairs,  elections, 
&c. ;  then  all  kinds  of  inner  domestic  life — interiors  of  rooms, 
studies  of  costumes,  of  still  life,  and  heraldry,  including  mul- 
titudes of  symbolical  vignettes  ;  then  marine  scenery  of  every 
kind,  full  of  local  incident  ;  every  kind  of  boat  and  method  of 
fishing  for  particular  fish,  being  specifically  drawn,  round  the 


262 


PRE-RA  PIIA  ELITISM. 


whole  coast  of  England  ; — pilchard  fishing  at  St.  Ives,  whiting 
fishing  at  Margate,  herring  at  Loch  Fyne  ;  and  all  kinds  of 
shipping,  including  studies  of  every  separate  part  of  the  ves- 
sels, and  many  marine  battle-pieces,  two  in  particular  of  Traf- 
algar, both  of  high  importance, — one  of  the  Victory  after  the 
battle,  now  in  Greenwich  Hospital ;  another  of  the  Death  of 
Nelson,  in  his  own  gallery  ;  then  all  kinds  of  mountain  scenery, 
some  idealised  into  compositions,  others  of  definite  localities ; 
together  with  classical  compositions,  Homes  and  Cartilages 
and  such  others,  by  the  myriad,  with  mythological,  histori- 
cal, or  allegorical  figures, — nymphs,  monsters,  and  spectres  ; 
heroes  and  divinities.* 

What  general  feeling,  it  may  be  asked  incredulously,  can 
possibly  pervade  all  this  ?  This,  the  greatest  of  all  feelings — 
an  utter  forgetfulness  of  self.  Throughout  the  whole  period 
with  which  we  are  at  present  concerned,  Turner  appears  as  a 
man  of  sympathy  absolutely  infinite — a  sympathy  so  all-em- 
bracing, that  I  know  nothing  but  that  of  Shakespeare  com- 
parable with  it,  A  soldier's  wife  resting  by  the  roadside  is 
not  beneath  it ;  Eizpah,  the  daughter  of  Aiah,  watching  the 
dead  bodies  of  her  sons,  not  above  it.  Nothing  can  possibly 
be  so  mean  as  that  it  will  not  interest  his  whole  mind,  and 
carry  away  his  whole  heart ;  nothing  so  great  or  solemn  but 
that  he  can  raise  himself  into  harmony  with  it ;  and  it  is  im- 
possible to  prophesy  of  him  at  any  moment,  whether,  the  next, 
he  will  be  in  laughter  or  in  tears. 

This  is  the  root  of  the  man's  greatness ;  and  it  follows  as  a 
matter  of  course  that  this  sympathy  must  give  him  a  subtle 
power  of  expression,  even  of  the  characters  of  mere  material 
things,  such  as  no  other  painter  ever  possessed.  The  man 
who  can  best  feel  the  difference  between  rudeness  and  tender- 
ness in  humanity,  perceives  also  more  difference  between  the 
branches  of  an  oak  and  a  willow  than  any  one  else  would  ;  and. 
therefore,  necessarily  the  most  striking  character  of  the  draw- 
ings themselves  is  the  speciality  of  whatever  they  represent — • 
the  thorough  stiffness  of  what  is  stiff,  and  grace  of  what  is 

*  I  shall  give  a  catalogue  raisonnce  of  all  this  in  the  third  volume  of 
u  Modern  Painters," 


PRE-BAPHAELITISM. 


263 


graceful,  and  vastness  of  what  is  vast ;  but  through  and  beyond 
all  this,  the  condition  of  the  mind  of  the  painter  himself  is 
easily  enough  discoverable  by  comparison  of  a  large  number 
of  the  drawings.  It  is  singularly  serene  and  peaceful :  in  it- 
self quite  passionless,  though  entering  with  ease  into  the  ex- 
ternal passion  which  it  contemplates.  By  the  effort  of  its 
will  it  sympathises  with  tumult  or  distress,  even  in  their  ex- 
tremes, but  there  is  no  tumult,  no  sorrow  in  itself,  only  a 
chastened  and  exquisitely  peaceful  cheerfulness,  deeply  medi- 
tative ;  touched  without  loss  of  its  own  perfect  balance,  by 
sadness  on  the  one  side,  and  stooping  to  playfulness  upon  the 
other.  I  shall  never  cease  to  regret  the  destruction,  by  fire, 
now  several  years  ago,  of  a  drawing  which  always  seemed  to 
me  to  be  the  perfect  image  of  the  painter's  mind  at  this 
period,  —  the  drawing  of  Brignai  Church  near  Bokeby,  of 
which  a  feeble  idea  may  still  be  gathered  from  the  engraving 
(in  the  Yorkshire  series).  The  spectator  stands  on  the  "Brig- 
nai banks,"  looking  down  into  the  glen  at  twilight ;  the  sky 
is  still  full  of  soft  rays,  though  the  sun  is  gone  ;  and  the 
Greta  glances  brightly  in  the  valley,  singing  its  evening-song ; 
two  white  clouds,  following  each  other,  move  without  wind 
through  the  hollows  of  the  ravine,  and  others  lie  couched  on 
the  far  away  moorlands ;  every  leaf  of  the  woods  is  still  in  the 
delicate  air ;  a  boy's  kite,  incapable  of  rising,  has  become  en- 
tangled in  their  branches,  he  is  climbing  to  recover  it ;  and 
just  behind  it  in  the  picture,  almost  indicated  by  it,  the  lowly 
church  is  seen  in  its  secluded  field  between  the  rocks  and  the 
stream  ;  and  around  it  the  low  churchyard  wall,  and  the  few 
white  stones  which  mark  the  resting  places  of  those  who  can 
climb  the  rocks  no  more,  nor  hear  the  river  sing  as  it  passes. 

There  are  many  other  existing  drawings  which  indicate  the 
same  character  of  mind,  though  I  think  none  so  touching  or 
so  beautiful ;  yet  they  are  not,  as  I  said  above,  more  numerous 
than  those  which  express  his  sympathy  with  sublimer  or  more 
active  scenes  ;  but  they  are  almost  always  marked  by  a  ten- 
derness of  execution,  and  have  a  look  of  being  beloved  in 
every  part  of  them,  which  shows  them  to  be  the  truest  expres- 
sion of  his  own  feelings. 


264 


PRE-RAPHAELITISM. 


One  other  characteristic  of  his  mind  at  this  period  remains 
to  be  noticed — its  reverence  for  talent  in  others.  Not  the 
reverence  which  acts  upon  the  practices  of  men  as  if  they  were 
the  laws  of  nature,  hut  that  which  is  ready  to  appreciate  the 
power,  and  receive  the  assistance,  of  every  mind  which  has 
been  previously  employed  in  the  same  direction,  so  far  as  its 
teaching  seems  to  be  consistent  with  the  great  text-book  of 
nature  itself.  Turner  thus  studied  almost  every  preceding 
landscape  painter,  chiefly  Claude,  Poussin,  Vandevelde, 
Loutherbourg,  and  "Wilson.  It  was  probably  by  the  Sir 
George  Beaumonts  and  other  feeble  conventionalists  of  the 
period,  that  he  was  persuaded  to  devote  his  attention  to  the 
works  of  these  men  ;  and  his  having  done  so  will  be  thought, 
a  few  scores  of  years  hence,  evidence  of  perhaps  the  greatest 
modesty  ever  shown  by  a  man  of  original  power.  Modesty 
at  once  admirable  and  unfortunate,  for  the  study  of  the  works 
of  Vandevelde  and  Claude  was  productive  of  unmixed  mischief 
to  him  ;  he  spoiled  many  of  his  marine  pictures,  as  for  instance 
Lord  Eilesmere's,  by  imitation  of  the  former ;  and  from  the 
latter  learned  a  false  ideal,  which  confirmed  by  the  notions  of 
Greek  art  prevalent  in  London  in  the  beginning  of  this  cen- 
tury, has  manifested  itself  in  many  vulgarities  in  his  composi- 
tion pictures,  vulgarities  which  may  perhaps  be  best  expressed 
by  the  general  term  "  Twickenham  Classicism,"  as  consisting 
principally  in  conceptions  of  ancient  or  of  rural  life  such  as 
have  influenced  the  erection  of  most  of  our  suburban  villas. 
From  Mcolo  Poussin  and  Loutherbourg  he  seems  to  have  de- 
rived advantage  ;  perhaps  also  from  Wilson  ;  and  much  in  his 
subsequent  travels  from  far  higher  men,  especially  Tintoret 
and  Paiil  Veronese.  I  have  myself  heard  him  speaking  with 
singular  delight  of  the  putting  in  of  the  beech  leaves  in  the 
upper  right-hand  corner  of  Titian's  Peter  Martyr.  I  cannot  in 
any  of  his  works  trace  the  slightest  influence  of  Salvator  ;  and 
I  am  not  surprised  at  it,  for  though  Salvator  was  a  man  of  far 
higher  powers  than  either  Vandevelde  or  Claude,  he  was  a 
wilful  and  gross  caricaturist  Turner  would  condescend  to  be 
helped  by  feeble  men,  but  could  not  be  corrupted  by  false 
men.    Besides,  he  had  never  himself  seen  classical  life,  and 


PRE-  RA  PR A  EL  I TISM. 


265 


Claude  was  represented  to  him  as  competent  authority  for  it. 
But  he  had  seen  mountains  and  torrents,  and  knew  therefore 
that  Salvator  could  not  paint  them. 

One  of  the  most  characteristic  drawings  of  this  period  for- 
tunately bears  a  date,  1818,  and  brings  us  within  two  years 
of  another  dated  drawing,  no  less  characteristic  of  what  I 
shall  henceforward  call  Turner's  Second  period.  It  is  in  the 
possession  of  Mr.  Kawkesworth  Fawkes  of  Farnley,  one  of 
Turner's  earliest  and  truest  friends  ;  and  bears  the  inscription, 
unusually  conspicuous,  heaving  itself  up  and  down  over  the 
eminences  of  the  foreground — "  Passage  of  Mont  Cenis.  J. 
M.  W.  Turner,  January  15  th,  1820." 

The  scene  is  on  the  summit  of  the  pass  close  to  the  hospice, 
or  what  seems  to  have  been  a  hospice  at  that  time, — I  do  not 
remember  such  at  present, — a  small  square-built  house,  built 
as  if  partly  for  a  fortress,  with  a  detached  flight  of  stone  steps 
in  front  of  it,  and  a  kind  of  drawbridge  to  the  door.  This 
building,  about  400  or  500  yards  off,  is  seen  in  a  dim,  ashy 
grey  against  the  light,  which  by  help  of  a  violent  blast  of 
mountain  wind  has  broken  through  the  depth  of  clouds  which 
hangs  upon  the  crags.  There  is  no  sky,  properly  so  called, 
nothing  but  this  roof  of  drifting  cloud ;  but  neither  is  there 
any  weight  of  darkness — the  high  air  is  too  thin  for  it — all 
savage,  howling,  and  luminous  with  cold,  the  massy  bases  of 
the  granite  hills  jutting  out  here  and  there  grimly  through 
the  snow  wreaths.  There  is  a  desolate-looking  refuge  on  the 
left,  with  its  number  10,  marked  on  it  in  long  ghastly  figures, 
and  the  wind  is  drifting  the  snow  off  the  roof  and  through  its 
window  in  a  frantic  whirl  ;  the  near  ground  is  all  wan  with 
half-thawTed,  half-trampled  snow ;  a  diligence  in  front,  wrhose 
horses,  unable  to  face  the  wdnd,  have  turned  right  round  with 
fright,  its  passengers  struggling  to  escape,  jammed  in  the 
window  ;  a  little  farther  on  is  another  carriage  off  the  road, 
some  figures  pushing  at  its  wheels,  and  its  driver  at  the  horses' 
heads,  pulling  and  lashing  with  all  his  strength,  his  lifted  arm 
stretched  out  against  the  light  of  the  distance,  though  too  far 
off  for  the  whip  to  be  seen. 

Now  I  am  perfectly  certain  that  any  one  thoroughly  accus* 


266 


PRE-llAPHA  EU'J  'ISM. 


tomed  to  the  earlier  works  of  the  painter,  and  shown  this 
picture  for  the  first  time,  would  be  struck  by  two  altogether 
new  characters  in  it. 

The  first,  ■  a  seeming  enjoyment  of  the  excitement  of  the 
scene,  totally  different  from  the  contemplative  philosophy  with 
which  it  would  formerly  have  been  regarded.  Every  incident 
of  motion  and  of  energy  is  siezed  upon  with  indescribable 
delight,  and  every  line  of  the  composition  animated  with  a 
force  and  fury  which  are  now  no  longer  the  mere  expression 
of  a  contemplated  external  truth,  but  have  origin  in  some  in- 
herent feeling  in  the  painter's  mind. 

The  second,  that  although  the  subject  is  one  in  itself  almost 
incapable  of  color,  and  although,  in  order  to  increase  the 
wildness  of  the  impression,  all  brilliant  local  color  has  been 
refused  even  where  it  might  easily  have  been  introduced,  as 
in  the  figures  ;  yet  in  the  low  minor  key  which  has  been 
chosen,  the  melodies  of  color  have  been  elaborated  to  the 
utmost  possible  pitch,  so  as  to  become  a  leading,  instead  of  a 
subordinate,  element  in  the  composition  ;  the  subdued  warm 
hues  of  the  granite  promontories,  the  dull  stone  color  of  the 
walls  of  the  buildings,  clearly  opposed,  even  in  shade,  to  the 
grey  of  the  snow  wreaths  heaped  against  them,  and  the  faint 
greens  and  ghastly  blues  of  the  glacier  ice,  being  all  expressed 
with  delicacies  of  transition  utterly  unexampled  in  any  previ- 
ous drawings. 

These,  accordingly,  are  the  chief  characteristics  of  the  wTorks 
of  Turner's  second  period,  as  distinguished  from  the  first, — a 
new  energy  inherent  in  the  mind  of  the  painter,  diminishing 
the  repose  and  exalting  the  force  and  fire  of  his  conceptions, 
and  the  presence  of  Color,  as  at  least  an  essential,  and  often 
a  principal,  element  of  design. 

Not  that  it  is  impossible,  or  even  unusual,  to  find  drawings 
of  serene  subject,  and  perfectly  quiet  feeling,  among  the  com- 
positions of  this  period  ;  but  the  repose  is  in  them,  just  as  the 
energy  and  tumult  were  in  the  earlier  period,  an  external 
quality,  which  the  painter  images  by  an  effort  of  the  wTill :  it 
is  no  longer  a  character  inherent  in  himself.  The  "  Ulleswater," 
in  the  England  series,  is  one  of  those  which  are  in  most  per- 


PRE-RA  PIIAELIT18M. 


2G7 


feet  peace  :  in  the  "  Cowes,"  the  silence  is  only  broken  by  the 
clash  of  the  boat's  oars,  and  in  the  " Alnwick"  by  a  stag 
drinking  ;  but  in  at  least  nine  drawings  out  of  ten,  either  sky, 
water,  or  figures  are  in  rapid  motion,  and  the  grandest  draw- 
ings are  almost  always  those  which  have  even  violent  action 
in  one  or  other,  or  in  all :  e.  g.  high  force  of  Tees,  Coventry, 
Llanthony,  Salisbury,  Llanberis,  and  such  others. 

The  color  is,  however,  a  more  absolute  distinction  ;  and  we 
must  return  to  Mr.  Fawkes's  collection  in  order  to  see  how 
the  change  in  it  was  effected.  That  such  a  change  would  take 
place  at  one  time  or  other  was  of  course  to  be  securely  antici- 
pated, the  conventional  system  of  the  first  period  being,  as 
above  stated,  merely  a  means  of  Study.  But  the  immediate 
cause  was  the  journey  of  the  year  1820.  As  might  be  guessed 
from  the  legend  on  the  drawing  above  described,  "  Passage 
of  Mont  Cenis,  January  15th,  1820,"  that  drawing  represents 
what  happened  on  the  day  in  question  to  the  painter  himself. 
He  passed  the  Alps  then  in  the  winter  of  1820  ;  and  either  in 
the  previous  or  subsequent  summer,  but  on  the  same  journey, 
he  made  a  series  of  sketches  on  the  Khine,  in  body  color,  now 
in  Mr.  FawTkes's  collection.  Every  one  of  those  sketches  is 
the  almost  instantaneous  record  of  an  effect  of  color  or  atmo- 
sphere, taken  strictly  from  nature,  the  drawing  and  the  details 
of  every  subject  being  comparatively  subordinate,  and  the 
color  nearly  as  principal  as  the  light  and  shade  had  been  be- 
fore,— certainly  the  leading  feature,  though  the  light  and 
shade  are  always  exquisitely  harmonized  with  it.  And  natu- 
rally, as  the  color  becomes  the  leading  object,  those  times  of 
day  are  chosen  in  which  it  is  most  lovely  ;  and  whereas  before, 
at  least  five  out  of  six  of  Turner's  drawings  represented  ordi- 
nary daylight,  we  now  find  his  attention  directed  constantly 
to  the  evening  :  and,  for  the  first  time,  we  have  those  rosy 
lights  upon  the  hills,  those  gorgeous  falls  of  sun  through 
flaming  heavens,  those  solemn  twilights,  with  the  blue  moon 
rising  as  the  western  sky  grows  dim,  which  have  ever  since 
been  the  themes  of  his  mightiest  thoughts. 

I  have  no  doubt,  that  the  immediate  reason  of  this  change 
was  the  impression  made  upon  him  by  the  colors  of  the  con- 


268 


PRE-llAPHA  ELITISM. 


tinental  skies.  When  he  first  travelled  on  the  Continent 
(1800),  he  was  comparatively  a  young  student ;  not  yet  able 
to  draw  form  as  he  wanted,  he  was  forced  to  give  all  his 
thoughts  and  strength  to  this  primary  object.  But  now  he 
was  free  to  receive  other  impressions  ;  the  time  was  come  for 
perfecting  his  art,  and  the  first  sunset  which  he  saw  on  the 
Rhine  taught  him  that  all  previous  landscape  art  was  vain 
and  valueless,  that  in  comparison  with  natural  color,  the 
things  that  had  been  called  paintings  were  mere  ink  and 
charcoal,  and  that  all  precedent  and  all  authority  must  be 
cast  away  at  once,  and  trodden  under  foot.  He  cast  them 
away :  the  memories  of  Vandevelde  and  Claude  were  at  once 
weeded  out  of  the  great  mind  they  had  encumbered  ;  they 
and  all  the  rubbish  of  the  schools  together  with  them  ;  the 
waves  of  the  Rhine  swept  them  away  for  ever ;  and  a  new 
dawn  rose  over  the  rocks  of  the  Siebengebirge. 

There  was  another  motive  at  work,  which  rendered  the 
change  still  more  complete.  His  fellow  artists  were  already 
conscious  enough  of  his  superior  power  in  drawing,  and  their 
best  hope  was,  that  he  might  not  be  able  to  color.  They  had 
begun  to  express  this  hope  loudly  enough  for  it  to  reach  his 
ears.  The  engraver  of  one  of  his  most  important  marine 
pictures  told  me,  not  long  ago,  that  one  day  about  the  period 
in  question,  Turner  came  into  his  room  to  examine  the 
progress  of  the  plate,  not  having  seen  his  own  picture  for 
several  months.  It  was  one  of  his  dark  early  pictures,  but  in 
the  foreground  was  a  little  piece  of  luxury,  a  pearly  fish 
wrought  into  hues  like  those  of  an  opal.  He  stood  before  the 
picture  for  some  moments  ;  then  laughed,  and  pointed  joy- 
ously to  the  fish  ; — "  They  say  that  Turner  can't  color !  "  and 
turned  away. 

Under  the  force  of  these  various  impulses  the  change  was 
total.  Every  subject  thenceforth  was  primarily  conceived  in 
color;  and  no  engraving  ever  gave  the  slightest  idea  of  any 
drawing  of  this  period. 

The  artists  who  had  any  perception  of  the  truth  were  in 
despair ;  the  Beaumontites,  classicalists,  and  "  owl  species  ,; 
in  .general,  in  as  much  indignation  as  their  dulness  was  capa- 


PRE- II A  VII A  ELITISM. 


269 


ble  of.  They  had  deliberately  closed  their  eyes  to  all  nature, 
and  had  gone  on  inquiring,  4 'Where  do  ycu  put  your  brown 
tree  ?"  A  vast  revelation  was  made  to  them  at  once,  enough 
to  have  dazzled  any  one  ;  but  to  them,  light  unendurable  as 
incomprehensible.  They  "  did  to  the  moon  complain,"  in  one 
vociferous,  unanimous,  continuous  "  Tu  whoo."  Shrieking 
rose  from  all  dark  places  at  the  same  instant,  just  the  same 
kind  of  shrieking  that  is  now  raised  against  the  Pre-Raphael- 
ites.  Those  glorious  old  Arabian  Nights,  how  true  they  are  ! 
Mocking  and  whispering,  and  abuse  loud  and  low  by  turns, 
from  all  the  black  stones  beside  the  road,  when  one  living  soul 
is  toiling  up  the  hill  to  get  the  golden  water.  Mocking  and 
whispering,  that  he  may  look  back,  and  become  a  black  stone 
like  themselves. 

Turner  looked  not  back,  but  he  went  on  in  such  a  temper 
as  a  strong  man  must  be  in,  when  he  is  forced  to  walk  with 
his  fingers  in  his  ears.  He  retired  into  himself  ;  he  could 
look  no  longer  for  help,  or  counsel,  or  sympathy  from  any 
one  ;  and  the  spirit  of  defiance  in  which  he  wras  forced  to 
labor  led  him  sometimes  into  violences,  from  which  the 
slightest  expression  of  sympathy  would  have  saved  him.  The 
new  energy  that  was  upon  him,  and  the  utter  isolation  into 
which  he  was  driven,  were  both  alike  dangerous,  and  many 
drawings  of  the  time  show  the  evil  effects  of  both  ;  some  of 
them  being  hasty,  wild,  or  experimental,  and  others  little 
more  than  magnificent  expressions  of  defiance  of  public 
opinion. 

But  all  have  this  noble  virtue — they  are  in  everything  his 
own  :  there  are  no  more  reminiscences  of  dead  masters,  no 
more  trials  of  skill  in  the  manner  of  Claude  or  Poussin  ;  every 
faculty  of  his  soul  is  fixed  upon  nature  only,  as  he  saw  her, 
or  as  he  remembered  her. 

I  have  spoken  above  of  his  gigantic  memory  :  it  is  espe- 
cially necessary  to  notice  this,  in  order  that  we  may  understand 
the  kind  of  grasp  wrhich  a  man  of  real  imagination  takes  of 
all  things  that  are  once  brought  within  his  reach — grasp 
thenceforth  not  to  be  relaxed  for  ever. 

On  looking  over  any  catalogues  of  his  works,  or  of  par- 


270 


PRE-  RAP II A  ELITISM. 


ticular  series  of  them,  we  shall  notice  the  recurrence  of  the 
same  subject  two,  three,  or  even  many  times.  In  any  other 
artist  this  wTould  "be  nothing  remarkable.  Probably  most 
modern  landscape  painters  multiply  a  favorite  subject  twenty, 
thirty,  or  sixty  fold,  putting  the  shadows  and  the  clouds  in 
different  places,  and  "  inventing, "  as  they  are  pleased  to  call 
it,  a  new  "  effect "  every  time.  But  if  we  examine  the  suc- 
cessions of  Turner's  subjects,  we  shall  find  them  either  the 
records  of  a  succession  of  impressions  actually  perceived  by 
him  at  some  favorite  locality,  or  else  repetitions  of  one  im- 
pression received  in  early  youth,  and  again  and  again  realised 
as  his  increasing  powers  enabled  him  to  do  better  justice  to 
it.  In  either  case  we  shall  find  them  records  of  seen  facts  ; 
never  compositions  in  his  room  to  fill  up  a  favorite  outline. 

For  instance,  every  traveller,  at  least  every  traveller  of 
thirty  years'  standing,  must  love  Calais,  the  place  where  he 
first  felt  himself  in  a  strange  world.  Turner  evidently  loved 
it  excessively.  I  have  never  catalogued  his  studies  of  Calais, 
but  I  remember,  at  this  moment,  five  :  there  is  first  the  "  Pas 
de  Calais,"  a  very  large  oil  painting,  which  is  what  he  saw  in 
broad  daylight  as  he  crossed  over,  when  he  got  near  the 
French  side.  It  is  a  careful  study  of  French  fishing  boats 
running  for  the  shore  before  the  wind,  with  the  picturesque 
old  city  in  the  distance.  Then  there  is  the  cc  Calais  Harbor  " 
in  the  Liber  Studiorum  :  that  is  what  he  saw  just  as  he  was 
going  into  the  harbor, — a  heavy  brig  warping  out,  and  very 
likely  to  get  in  his  way,  or  run  against  the  pier,  and  bad 
weather  coming  on.  Then  there  is  the  £C  Calais  Pier,"  a  large 
painting,  engraved  some  years  ago  by  Mr.  Lupton  :  *  that  is 
what  he  saw  when  he  had  landed,  and  ran  back  directly  to  the 
pier  to  see  what  had  become  of  the  brig.  The  weather  had 
got  still  worse,  the  fishwomen  were  being  blown  about  in  a 
distressful  manner  on  the  pier  head,  and  some  more  fishing 
boats  were  running  in  with  all  speed.  Then  there  is  the 
"Fortrouge,"  Calais  :  that  is  wThat  he  saw  after  he  had  been 
home  to  Dessein's,  and  dined,  and  went  out  again  in  the  even- 
ing to  walk  on  the  sands,  the  tide  being  down.  He  had  never 
*  The  plate  was,  however,  never  published. 


PBE-RAPHAELITISM. 


271 


seen  such  a  waste  of  sands  before,  and  it  made  an  impression 
on  him.  The  shrimp  girls  were  all  scattered  over  them  too, 
and  moved  about  in  white  spots  on  the  wild  shore  ;  and  the 
storm  had  lulled  a  little,  and  there  was  a  sunset — such  a  sun- 
set,— and  the  bars  of  Fortrouge  seen  against  it,  skeleton-wise. 
He  did  not  paint  that  directly  ;  thought  over  it, — painted  it 
a  long  while  afterwards. 

Then  there  is  the  vignette  in  the  illustrations  to  Scott. 
That  is  what  he  saw  as  he  was  going  home,  meditatively ;  and 
the  revolving  lighthouse  came  blazing  out  upon  him  suddenly, 
and  disturbed  him.  He  did  not  like  that  so  much  ;  made  a 
vignette  of  it,  however,  when  he  was  asked  to  do  a  bit  of 
Calais,  twenty  or  thirty  years  afterwards,  having  already  done 
all  the  rest. 

Turner  never  told  me  all  this,  but  any  one  may  see  it  if  he 
will  compare  the  pictures.  They  might,  possibly,  not  be  im- 
pressions of  a  single  day,  but  of  two  days  or  three  ;  though 
in  all  human  probability  they  were  seen  just  as  I  have  stated 
them  ;  *  but  they  are  records  of  successive  impressions,  as 
plainly  written  as  ever  traveller's  diary.  All  of  them  pure 
veracities.    Therefore  immortal. 

I  could  multipijr  these  series  almost  indefinitely  from  the 
rest  of  his  works.  What  is  curious,  some  of  them  have  a  kind 
of  private  mark  running  through  all  the  subjects.  Thus  I 
know  three  drawings  of  Scarborough,  and  all  of  them  have  a 
starfish  in  the  foreground  :  I  do  not  remember  any  others  of 
his  marine  subjects  which  have  a  starfish. 

The  other  kind  of  repetition — the  recurrence  to  one  early 
impression — is  however  still  more  remarkable.  In  the  collec- 
tion of  F.  H.  Bale,  Esq.,  there  is  a  small  drawing  of  Llanthony 
Abbey.  It  is  in  his  boyish  manner,  its  date  probably  about 
1795  ;  evidently  a  sketch  from  nature,  finished  at  home.  It 
had  been  a  showery  day  ;  the  hills  v/ere  partially  concealed 
by  the  rain,  and  gleams  of  sunshine  breaking  out  at  intervals. 
A  man  was  fishing  in  the  mountain  stream.    The  young 

*  And  the  more  probably  because  Turner  was  never  fond  of  staying 
long  at  any  place,  and  was  least  of  all  likely  to  make  a  pause  of  two  or 
three  days  at  the  beginning  of  his  journey. 


272 


PRE-  RAPIIA  ELITISM. 


Turner  sought  a  place  of  some  shelter  under  the  bushes  • 
made  his  sketch,  took  great  pains  when  he  got  home  to  imi- 
tate the  rain,  as  he  best  could  ;  added  his  child's  luxury  of  a 
rainbow  ;  put  in  the  very  bush  under  which  he  had  taken 
shelter,  and  the  fisherman,  a  somewhat  ill-jointed  and  long- 
legged  fisherman,  in  the  eourtty  short  breeches  which  were  the 
fashion  of  the  time. 

Some  thirty  years  afterwards,  with  all  his  powers  in  their 
strongest  training,  and  after  the  total  change  in  his  feelings 
and  principles  which  I  have  endeavored  to  describe,  he  un- 
dertook the  series  of  "  England  and  Wales,"  and  in  that  series 
introduced  the  subject  of  Llanthony  Abbey.  And  behold,  he 
went  back  to  his  boy's  sketch,  and  boy's  thought.  He  kept 
the  very  bushes  in  their  places,  but  brought  the  fisherman  to 
the  other  side  of  the  river,  and  put  him,  in  somewhat  less 
courtly  dress,  under  their  shelter,  instead  of  himself.  And 
then  he  set  all  his  gained  strength  and  new  knowledge  at 
work  on  the  well-remembered  shower  of  rain,  that  had  fallen 
thirty  years  before,  to  do  it  better.  The  resultant  drawing* 
is  one  of  the  very  noblest  of  his  second  period. 

Another  of  the  drawings  of  the  England  series,  Ulleswater, 
is  the  repetition  of  one  in  Mr.  Fawkes's  collection,  which,  by 
the  method  of  its  execution,  I  should  conjecture  to  have  been 
executed  about  the  year  1808,  or  1810  :  at  all  events,  it  is  a 
very  quiet  drawing  of  the  first  period.  The  lake  is  quite 
calm  ;  the  western  hills  in  grey  shadow,  the  eastern  massed  in 
light.  Helvellyn  rising  like  a  mist  between  them,  all  being 
mirrored  in  the  calm  water.  Some  thin  and  slightly  evanes- 
cent cows  are  standing  in  the  shallow  water  in  front ;  a  boat 
floats  motionless  about  a  hundred  yards  from  the  shore  :  the 
foreground  is  of  broken  rocks,  with  lovely  pieces  of  copse  on 
the  right  and  left. 

This  was  evidently  Turner's  record  of  a  quiet  evening  by 
the  shore  of  Ulleswater,  but  it  was  a  feeble  one.  He  could 
not  at  that  time  render  the  sunset  colors  :  he  went  back  to 
it  therefore  in  the  England  series,  and  painted  it  again  with 
his  new  power.  The  same  hills  are  there,  the  same  shadows, 
*  Vide  Modern  Painters,  Fart  II.  Sect.  III.  Chap.  IV.  §  14. 


PRE-RAPI1A  ELITISM. 


273 


the  same  cows, — they  bad  stood  in  his  mind,  on  the  same 
spot,  for  twenty  years, — the  same  boat,  the  same  rocks,  only 
the  copse  is  cut  away — it  interfered  with  the  masses  of  his  col- 
or :  some  figures  are  introduced  bathing,  and  what  was  grey, 
and  feeble  gold  in  the  first  drawing,  becomes  purple,  and  burn- 
ing rose-color  in  the  last. 

But  perhaps  one  of  the  most  curious  examples  is  in  the 
series  of  subjects  from  Winchelsea.  That  in  the  Liber  Stu- 
diorum,  "  Winchelsea,  Sussex,"  bears  date  1812,  and  its  fig- 
ures consist  of  a  soldier  speaking  to  a  woman,  who  is  resting 
on  the  bank  beside  the  road.  There  is  another  small  subject, 
with  Winchelsea  in  the  distance,  of  which  the  engraving  bears 
date  1817.  It  has  two  women  with  bundles,  and  two  soldiers 
toiling  along  the  embankment  in  the  plain,  and  a  baggage 
waggon  in  the  distance.  Neither  of  these  seems  to  have  sat- 
isfied him,  and  at  last  he  did  another  for  the  England  series, 
of  which  the  engraving  bears  date  1830.  There  is  now  a  regi- 
ment on  the  march  ;  the  baggage  waggon  is  there,  having  got 
no  further  on  in  the  thirteen  years,  but  one  of  the  women  is 
tired,  and  has  fainted  on  the  bank  ;  another  is  supporting  her 
against  her  bundle,  and  giving  her  drink  ;  a  third  sympathetic 
woman  is  added,  and  the  two  soldiers  have  stopped,  and  one 
is  drinking  from  his  canteen. 

Nor  is  it  merely  of  entire  scenes,  or  of  particular  incidents, 
that  Turners  memory  is  thus  tenacious.  The  slightest  pas- 
sages of  color  or  arrangement  that  have  pleased  him — the 
fork  of  a  bough,  the  casting  of  a  shadow,  the  fracture  of  a 
stone — will  be  taken  up  again  and  again,  and  strangely  worked 
into  new  relations  with  other  thoughts.  There  is  a  single 
sketch  from  nature  in  one  of  the  portfolios  at  Farnley,  of  a 
common  wood- walk  on  the  estate,  which  has  furnished  pas- 
sages to  no  fewrer  than  three  of  the  most  elaborate  composi- 
tions in  the  Liber  Studiorum. 

I  am  thus  tedious  in  dwelling  on  Turner  s  powers  of  memory, 
because  I  wish  it  to  be  thoroughly  seen  how  all  his  greatness, 
all  his  infinite  luxuriance  of  invention,  depends  on  his  taking- 
possession  of  everything  that  he  sees, — on  his  grasping  all, 
and  losing  hold  of  nothing, — on  his  forgetting  himself,  and 


274 


PRE-  RAPII A  ELITISM. 


forgetting  nothing  else.  I  wish  it  to  be  understood  how  every 
great  man  paints  what  he  sees  or  did  see,  his  greatness  being 
indeed  little  else  than  his  intense  sense  of  fact.  And  thus 
Fre-Eaphaelitism  and  Baphaelitism,  and  Turnerism,  are  ali 
one  and  the  same,  so  far  as  education  can  influence  them. 
They  are  different  in  their  choice,  different  in  their  faculties, 
but  all  the  same  in  this,  that  Eaphael  himself,  so  far  as  he  was 
great,  and  all  who  preceded  or  followed  him  who  ever  wrere 
great,  became  so  by  painting  the  truths  around  them  as  they 
appeared  to  each  man's  own  mind,  not  as  he  had  been  i aught 
to  see  them,  except  by  the  God  who  made  both  him  and 
them. 

There  is,  however,  one  more  characteristic  of  Turner's 
second  period,  on  which  I  have  still  to  dwell,  especially 
with  reference  to  what  has  been  above  advanced  respecting 
the  fallacy  of  overtoil ;  namely,  the  magnificent  ease  with 
which  all  is  done  when  it  is  successfully  done.  For  there  are 
one  or  two  drawings  of  this  time  which  are  not  done  easily. 
Turner  had  in  these  set  himself  to  do  a  fine  thing  to  exhibit 
his  powers  ;  in  the  common  phrase,  to  excel  himself  ;  so  sure  as 
he  does  this,  the  work  is  a  failure.  The  worst  drawings  that 
have  ever  come  from  his  hands  are  some  of  this  second  period, 
on  which  he  has  spent  much  time  and  laborious  thought ; 
drawings  filled  with  incident  from  one  side  to  the  other,  with 
skies  stippled  into  morbid  blue,  and  warm  lights  set  against 
them  in  violent  contrast ;  one  of  Bamborough  Castle,  a  large 
water-color,  may  be  named  as  an  example.  But  the  truly 
noble  works  are  those  in  which,  without  effort,  he  has  expressed 
his  thoughts  as  they  came,  and  forgotten  himself  ;  and  in  these 
the  outpouring  of  invention  is  not  less  miraculous  than  the 
swiftness  and  obedience  of  the  mighty  hand  that  expresses  it. 
Any  one  who  examines  the  drawings  may  see  the  evidence  of 
this  facility-,  in  the  strange  freshness  and  sharpness  of  every 
touch  of  color  ;  but  when  the  multitude  of  delicate  touches, 
with  which  all  the  aerial  tones  are  worked,  is  taken  into  con- 
sideration, it  would  still  appear  impossible  that  the  drawing 
could  have  been  completed  with  ease,  unless  we  had  direct 
evidence  in  the  matter  :  fortunately,  it  is  not  wanting.  There 


PRE-RAPHA  ELITISM. 


275 


is  a  drawing  in  Mr.  Fawkes's  collection  of  a  man-of-war  taking 
in  stores  :  it  is  of  the  usual  size  of  those  of  the  England  se- 
ries, about  sixteen  inches  by  eleven  :  it  does  not  appear  one 
of  the  most  highly  finished,  but  is  still  farther  removed  from 
slightness.  The  hull  of  a  first-rate  occupies  nearly  one-half 
of  the  picture  on  the  right,  her  bows  towards  the  spectator, 
seen  in  sharp  perspective  from  stem  to  stern,  with  all  her 
portholes,  guns,  anchors,  and  lower  rigging  elaborately  de- 
tailed ;  there  are  two  other  ships  of  the  line  in  the  middle  dis- 
tance, drawn  with  equal  precision  ;  a  noble  breezy  sea  dancing 
against  their  broad  bows,  full  of  delicate  drawing  in  its  waves  ; 
a  store-ship  beneath  the  hull  of  the  larger  vessel,  and  several 
other  boats,  and  a  complicated  cloudy  sky.  It  might  appear 
no  small  exertion  of  mind  to  draw  the  detail  of  all  this  ship- 
ping down  to  the  smallest  ropes,  from  memory,  in  the  draw- 
ing-room of  a  mansion  in  the  middle  of  Yorkshire,  even  if 
considerable  time  had  been  given  for  the  effort.  But  Mr. 
Fawkes  sat  beside  the  painter  from  the  first  stroke  to  the  last. 
Turner  took  a  piece  of  blank  paper  one  morning  after  break- 
fast, outlined  his  ships,  finished  the  drawing  in  three  hours, 
and  went  out  to  shoot. 

Let  this  single  fact  be  quietly  meditated  upon  by  our  ordi- 
nary painters,  and  they  will  see  the  truth  of  what  was  above 
asserted, — that  if  a  great  thing  can  be  done  at  all,  it  can  be 
done  easily  ;  and  let  them  not  torment  themselves  with  twist- 
ing of  compositions  this  way  and  that,  and  repeating,  and  ex- 
perimenting, and  scene-shifting.  If  a  man  can  compose  at 
all,  he  can  compose  at  once,  or  rather  he  must  compose  in 
spite  of  himself.  And  this  is  the  reason  of  that  silence  which 
I  have  kept  in  most  of  my  works,  on  the  subject  of  Composi- 
tion. Many  critics,  especially  the  architects,  have  found  fault 
with  me  for  not  "  teaching  people  how  to  arrange  masses  ; " 
for  not  "  attributing  sufficient  importance  to  composition." 
Alas  !  I  attribute  far  more  importance  to  it  than  they  do  ; — 
so  much  importance,  that  I  should  just  as  soon  think  of  sit- 
ting down  to  teach  a  man  how  to  write  a  Divina  Commedia, 
or  King  Lear,  as  how  to  "  compose,"  in  the  true  sense,  a  sin- 
gle building  or  picture.    The  marvellous  stupidity  of  this  age 


276 


PRE-RAPIIA  ELITISM. 


of  lecturers  is,  that  they  do  not  see  that  what  they  call  "  prin- 
ciples of  composition,"  are  mere  principles  of  common  sense 
in  everything,  as  well  as  in  pictures  and  buildings  ; — A  pict- 
ure is  to  have  a  principal  light  ?  Yes  ;  and  so  a  dinner  is  to 
have  a  principal  dish,  and  an  oration  a  principal  point,  and  an 
air  of  music  a  principal  note,  and  every  man  a  principal  ob- 
ject. A  picture  is  to  have  harmony  of  relation  among  its 
parts  ?  Yes  ;  and  so  is  a  speech  well  uttered,  and  an  action 
well  ordered,  and  a  company  well  chosen,  and  a  ragout  well 
mixed.  Composition  !  As  if  a  man  were  not  composing 
every  moment  of  his  life,  well  or  ill,  and  would  not  do  it  in- 
stinctively in  his  picture  as  well  as  elsewhere,  if  he  could. 
Composition  of  this  lower  or  common  kind  is  of  exactly  the 
same  importance  in  a  picture  that  it  is  in  any  thing  else, — no 
more.  It  is  well  that  a  man  should  say  what  he  has  to  say  in 
good  order  and  sequence,  but  the  main  thing  is  to  say  it  truly. 
And  yet  we  go  on  preaching  to  our  pupils  as  if  to  have  a  prin- 
cipal light  was  every  thing,  and  so  cover  our  academy  walls 
with  Shacabac  feasts,  wherein  the  courses  are  indeed  well  or- 
dered, but  the  dishes  empty. 

It  is  not,  however,  only  in  invention  that  men  overwork 
themselves,  but  in  execution  also  ;  and  here  I  have  a  word  to 
say  to  the  Pre-Raphaelites  specially.  They  are  working  too 
hard.  There  is  evidence  in  failing  portions  of  their  pictures, 
showing  that  they  have  wrought  so  long  upon  them  that  their 
very  sight  has  failed  for  weariness,  and  that  the  hand  refused 
any  more  to  obey  the  heart.  And,  besides  this,  there  are  cer- 
tain qualities  of  drawing  which  they  miss  from  over-careful- 
ness. For,  let  them  be  assured,  there  is  a  great  truth  lurking 
in  that  common  desire  of  men  to  see  things  done  in  what  they 
call  a  "  masterly,"  or  "  bold,"  or  "  broad,"  manner :  a  truth  op- 
pressed and  abused,  like  almost  every  other  in  this  world,  but 
an  eternal  one  nevertheless  ;  and  whatever  mischief  may  have 
followed  from  men's  looking  for  nothing  else  but  this  facility 
of  execution,  and  supposing  that  a  picture  was  assuredly  all 
right  if  only  it  were  done  with  broad  dashes  of  the  brush, 
still  the  truth  remains  the  same  : — that  because  it  is  not  in- 
tended that  men  shall  torment  or  weary  themselves  with  anj 


PRE-RA  PHAEL1TISM. 


earthly  labor,  it  is  appointed  that  the  noblest  results  should  * 
only  be  attainable  by  a  certain  ease  and  decision  of  manipula- 
tion. I  only  wish  people  understood  this  much  of  sculpture, 
as  well  as  of  painting,  and  could  see  that  the  finely  finished 
statue  is,  in  ninety-nine  cases  out  of  a  hundred,  a  far  more 
vulgar  work  than  that  which  shows  rough  signs  of  the  right 
hand  laid  to  the  workman's  hammer :  but  at  all  events,  in 
painting  it  is  felt  by  all  men,  and  justly  felt.  The  freedom  of 
the  lines  of  nature  can  only  be  represented  by  a  similar  free- 
dom in  the  hand  that  follows  them  ;  there  are  curves  in  the 
flow  of  the  hair,  and  in  the  form  of  the  features,  and  in  the 
muscular  outline  of  the  body,  which  can  in  no  wise  be  caught 
but  by  a  sympathetic  freedom  in  the  stroke  of  the  pencil.  I 
do  not  care  what  example  is  taken,  be  it  the  most  subtle  aud 
careful  work  of  Leonardo  himself,  there  will  be  found  a  play 
and  power  and  ease  in  the  outlines,  which  no  slow  effort  could 
ever  imitate.  And  if  the  Pre-Kaphaelites  do  not  understand 
how  this  kind  of  power,  in  its  highest  perfection,  may  be 
united  with  the  most  severe  rendering  of  all  other  orders  of 
truth,  and  especially  of  those  with  which  they  themselves  have 
most  sympathy,  let  them  look  at  the  drawings  of  John  Lewis. 

These  then  are  the  principal  lessons  which  we  have  to  learn 
from  Turner,  in  his  second  or  central  period  of  labor.  There 
is  one  more,  however,  to  be  received  ;  and  that  is  a  warning  ; 
for  towards  the  close  of  it,  what  with  doing  small  conventional 
vignettes  for  publishers,  making  showy  drawings  from  sketches 
taken  by  other  people  of  places  he  had  never  seen,  and  touch- 
ing up  the  bad  engravings  from  his  works  submitted  to  him 
almost  every  day, — engravings  utterly  destitute  of  animation, 
and  which  had  to  be  raised  into  a  specious  brilliancy  by 
scratching  them  over  with  white,  spotty  lights,  he  gradually 
got  inured  to  many  conventionalities,  and  even  falsities  ;  and, 
having  trusted  for  ten  or  twelve  years  almost  entirely  to  his 
memory  and  invention,  living  I  believe  mostly  in  London,  and 
receiving  a  new  sensation  only  from  the  burning  of  the 
Houses  of  Parliament,  he  painted  many  pictures  between 
1830  and  1840  altogether  unworthy  of  him.  But  he  was  not 
thus  to  close  his  career. 


278 


PRE-RA  PIT  A  EL  J  T1SM. 


In  the  summer  either  of  1840  or  1841,  he  undertook  another 
journey  into  Switzerland.  It  was  then  at  least  forty  years 
since  he  had  first  seen  the  Alps  ;  (the  source  of  the  Arveron, 
in  Mr.  Fawkes's  collection,  which  could  not  have  been  painted 
till  he  had  seen  the  thing  itself,  bears  date  1800,)  and  the 
direction  of  his  journey  in  1840  marks  his  fond  memory  of 
that  earliest  one  ;  for,  if  we  look  over  the  Swiss  studies  and 
drawings  executed  in  his  first  period,  we  shall  be  struck  with 
his  fondness  for  the  pass  of  the  St,  Gothard ;  the  most  elabo- 
rate drawing  in  the  Farnley  collection  is  one  of  the  Lake  of 
Lucerne  from  Fluelen  ;  and,  counting  the  Liber  Studiorum 
subjects,  there  are,  to  my  knowledge,  six  compositions  taken 
at  the  same  period  from  the  pass  of  Sfc.  Gothard,  and,  proba- 
bly, several  others  are  in  existence.  The  valleys  of  Sallenche, 
and  Chamouni,  and  Lake  of  Geneva,  are  the  only  other  Swiss 
scenes  which  seem  to  have  made  very  profound  impressions 
on  him. 

He  returned  in  1841  to  Lucerne  ;  walked  up  Mont  Pilate  on 
foot,  crossed  the  St.  Gothard,  and  returned  by  Lausanne  and 
Geneva.  He  made  a  large  number  of  colored  sketches  on  this 
journey,  and  realised  several  of  them  on  his  return.  The  draw- 
ings thus  produced  are  different  from  all  that  had  preceded 
them,  and  are  the  first  which  belong  definitely  to  wThat  I  shall 
henceforth  call  his  Third  period. 

The  perfect  repose  of  his  youth  had  returned  to  his  mind, 
while  the  faculties  of  imagination  and  execution  appeared  in 
renewed  strength ;  all  conventionality  being  done  away  with 
by  the  force  of  the  impression  which  he  had  received  from  the 
Alps,  after  his  long  separation  from  them.  The  drawings  are 
marked  by  a  peculiar  largeness  and  simplicity  of  thought : 
most  of  them  by  deep  serenity,  passing  into  melancholy  ;  all 
by  a  richness  of  color,  such  as  he  had  never  before  conceived. 
They,  and  the  works  done  in  following  years,  bear  the  same 
relation  to  those  of  the  rest  of  his  life  that  the  colors  of 
sunset  do  to  those  of  the  day;  and  will  be  recognised,  in  a  few 
years  more,  as  the  noblest  landscapes  ever  yet  conceived  by 
human  intellect. 

Such  has  been  the  career  of  the  greatest  painter  of  this 


PRE-RAPIIA  ELITISM. 


270 


century.  Many  a  century  may  pass  away  before  there  rises 
such  another ;  but  what  greatness  any  among  us  may  be  capa- 
ble of,  wiU,  at  least,  be  best  attained  by  following  in  his  path  ; 
by  beginning  in  all  quietness  and  hopefulness  to  use  whatever 
powers  we  may  possess  to  represent  the  things  around  us  as 
we  see  and  feel  them ;  trusting  to  the  close  of  life  to  give  the 
-perfect  crown  to  the  course  of  its  labors,  and  knowing  assur- 
edly that  the  determination  of  the  degree  in  which  watchful- 
ness is  to  be  exalted  into  invention,  rests  with  a  higher  will 
than  our  own.  And,  if  not  greatness,  at  least  a  certain  good, 
is  thus  to  be  achieved  ;  for  though  I  have  above  spoken  of  the 
mission  of  the  more  humble  artist,  as  if  it  were  merely  to  be 
subservient  to  that  of  the  antiquarian  or  the  man  of  science, 
there  is  an  ulterior  aspect  in  which  it  is  not  subservient,  but 
superior.  Every  archaeologist,  every  natural  philosopher, 
knows  that  there  is  a  peculiar  rigidity  of  mind  brought  on  by 
long  devotion  to  logical  and  analytical  inquiries.  Weak  men, 
giving  themselves  to  such  studies,  are  utterly  hardened  by 
them,  and  become  incapable  of  understanding  anything  nobler, 
or  even  of  feeling  the  value  of  the  results  to  which  they  lead. 
But  even  the  best  men  are  in  a  sort  injured  by  them,  and  pay 
a  definite  price,  as  in  most  other  matters,  for  definite  advan- 
tages. They  gain  a  peculiar  strength,  but  lose  in  tenderness, 
elasticity,  and  impressibility.  The  man  who  has  gone,  ham- 
mer in  hand,  over  the  surface  of  a  romantic  countiy,  feels 
no  longer,  in  the  mountain  ranges  he  has  so  laboriously  ex- 
plored, the  sublimity  or  mystery  with  wThich  they  were  veiled 
when  he  first  beheld  them,  and  with  which  they  are  adorned 
in  the  mind  of  the  passing  traveller.  In  his  more  informed 
conception,  they  arrange  themselves  like  a  dissected  model  : 
where  another  man  would  be  awe-struck  by  the  magnificence 
of  the  precipice,  he  sees  nothing  but  the  emergence  of  a  fos- 
siliferous  rock,  familiarised  already  to  his  imagination  as  ex- 
tending in  a  shallow  stratum,  over  a  perhaps  uninteresting 
district ;  where  the  unlearned  spectator  would  be  touched  with 
strong  emotion  by  the  aspect  of  the  snowy  summits  which  rise 
in  the  distance,  he  sees  only  the  culminating  points  of  a  met- 
amorphic  formation,  with  an  uncomfortable  web  of  fan-likQ 


PllE-llAPIIA  ELITISM. 


fissures  radiating,  in  his  imagination,  through  their  centres. * 
That  in  the  grasp  he  has  obtained  of  the  inner  relations  of  all 
these  things  to  the  universe,  and  to  man,  that  in  the  vieWa 
which  have  been  opened  to  him  of  natural  energies  such  as 
no  human  mind  would  have  ventured  to  conceive,  and  of  pa^t 
states  of  being,  each  in  some  new  way  bearing  witness  to  the 
unity  of  purpose  and  everlastingly  consistent  providence  of 
the  Maker  of  all  things,  he  has  received  reward  well  worthy 
the  sacrifice,  I  would  not  for  an  instant  deny  ;  but  the  sense 
of  the  loss  is  not  less  painful  to  him  if  his  mind  be  rightly 
constituted  ;  and  it  would  be  with  infinite  gratitude  that  he 
would  regard  the  man,  who,  retaining  in  his  delineation  of 
natural  scenery  a  fidelity  to  the  facts  of  science  so  rigid  as  to 
make  his  work  at  once  acceptable  and  credible  to  the  most 
sternly  critical  intellect,  should  yet  invest  its  features  again 
with  the  sweet  veil  of  their  daily  aspect ;  should  make  them 
dazzling  with  the  splendor  of  wandering  light,  and  involve 
them  in  the  unsearchableness  of  stormy  obscurity ;  should  re- 
store to  the  divided  anatomy  its  visible  vitality  of  operation, 
clothe  naked  crags  with  soft  forests,  enrich  the  mountain 
ruins  with  bright  pastures,  and  lead  the  thoughts  from  the 
monotonous  recurrence  of  the  phenomena  of  the  physical 
world,  to  the  sweet  interests  and  sorrows  of  human  life  and 
death. 

*  This  state  of  mind  appears  to  have  been  the  only  one  which  Words- 
worth had  been  able  to  discern  in  men  of  science ;  and  in  disdain  of 
which,  lie  wrote  that  short-sighted  passage  in  the  Excursion,  Book  III. 
1.  165 — 190,  which  is,  I  think,  the  only  one  in  the  whole  range  of  his 
works  which  his  true  friends  would  have  desired  to  see  blotted  out. 
What  else  has  been  found  fault  with  as  feeble  or  superfluous,  is  not  so 
in  the  intense  distinctive  relief  which  it  gives  to  his  character.  But 
these  lines  are  written  in  mere  ignorance  of  the  matter  they  treat ;  in 
mere  want  of  sympathy  with  the  men  they  describe ;  for,  observe,  though 
the  passage  is  put  into  the  mouth  of  the  Solitary,  it  is  fully  confirmed, 
and  even  rendered  more  scornful,  by  the  speech  which  follows. 


THE  END. 


ARATRA  PENTELICI 

SIX  LECTURES 

ON  THE  ELEMENTS  OF 

SCULPTURE 

1VEN  BEFORE  THE  UNIVERSITY  OF  OXFORD  IK 
MICHAELMAS  TERM,  1870 


PREFACE. 


I  must  pray  the  readers  of  the  following  Lectures  to  re- 
member that  the  duty  at  present  laid  on  me  at  Oxford  is  of 
an  exceptionally  complex  character.  Directly,  it  is  to  awaken 
the  interest  of  my  pupils  in  a  study  which  they  have  hitherto 
found  unattractive,  and  imagined  to  be  useless  ;  but  more 
imperatively,  it  is  to  define  the  principles  by  which  the  study 
itself  should  be  guided  ;  and  to  vindicate  their  security 
against  the  doubts  with  which  frequent  discussion  has  lately 
encumbered  a  subject  which  all  think  themselves  competent 
to  discuss.  The  possibility  of  such  vindication  is,  of  course, 
implied  in  the  original  consent  of  the  Universities  to  the  es- 
tablishment of  Art  Professorships.  Nothing  can  be  made  an 
element  of  education  of  which  it  is  impossible  to  determine 
whether  it  is  ill  done  or  well ;  and  the  clear  assertion  that 
there  is  a  canon  law  in  formative  Art  is,  at  this  time,  a  more 
important  function  of  each  University  than  the  instruction  of 
its  younger  members  in  any  branch  of  practical  skill.  It  mat- 
ters comparatively  little  whether  few  or  many  of  our  students 
learn  to  draw ;  but  it  matters  much  that  all  who  learn  should 
be  taught  with  accuracy.  And  the  number  who  may  be  justi- 
fiably advised  to  give  any  part  of  the  time  they  spend  at  col- 
lege to  the  study  of  painting  or  sculpture  ought  to  depend, 
and  finally  must  depend,  on  their  being  certified  that  paint- 
ing and  sculpture,  no  less  than  language  or  than  reasoning, 
have  grammar  and  method, — that  they  permit  a  recognizable 
distinction  between  scholarship  and  ignorance,  and  enforce  a 
constant  distinction  betwreen  Eight  and  Wrong. 

This  opening  course  of  Lectures  on  Sculpture  is  therefore 
restricted  to  the  statement,  not  only  of  first  principles,  but  of 


264 


PREFACE. 


those  which  were  illustrated  by  the  practice  of  one  school, 
and  by  that  practice  in  its  simplest  branch,  the  analysis  of 
which  could  be  certified  by  easily  accessible  examples,  and 
aided  by  the  indisputable  evidence  of  photography.* 

The  exclusion  of  the  terminal  Lecture  of  the  course  from 
the  series  now  published,  is  in  order  to  mark  more  definitely 
this  limitation  of  my  subject ;  but  in  other  respects  the  Lect- 
ures have  been  amplified  in  arranging  them  for  the  press, 
and  the  portions  of  them  trusted  at  the  time  to  extempore 
delivery,  (not  through  indolence,  but  because  explanations  of 
detail  are  always  most  intelligible  when  most  familiar,)  have 
been  in  substance  to  the  best  of  my  power  set  down,  and  in 
what  I  said  too  imperfectly,  completed. 

In  one  essential  particular  I  have  felt  it  necessary  to  write 
what  I  would  not  have  spoken.  I  had  intended  to  make  no 
reference,  in  my  University  Lectures,  to  existing  schools  of 

*  Photography  cannot  exhibit  the  character  of  large  and  finished  sculpt- 
ure ;  but  its  audacity  of  shadow  is  in  perfect  harmony  with  the  more 
roughly  picturesque  treatment  necessary  in  coins.  For  the  rendering 
of  all  such  frank  relief,  and  for  the  better  explanation  of  forms  disturbed 
by  the  lustre  of  metal  or  polished  stone,  the  method  employed  in  the 
plates  of  this  volume  will  be  found,  I  believe,  satisfactory.  Casts  are  first 
taken  from  the  coins,  in  white  plaster;  these  are  photographed,  and  the 
photograph  printed  by  the  heliotype  process  of  Messrs.  Edwards  and 
Kidd.  Plate  XII.  is  exceptional,  being  a  pure  mezzotint  engraving  of 
the  old  school,  excellently  carried  through  by  my  assistant,  Mr.  Allen, 
who  was  taught,  as  a  personal  favour  to  myself,  by  my  friend,  and  Tur- 
ner's fellow-worker,  Thomas  Lupton.  Plate  IV.  was  intended  to  be  a 
photograph  from  the  superb  vase  in  the  British  Museum,  No.  564  in 
Mr.  Newton's  Catalogue  ;  but  its  variety  of  colour  deied  photography, 
and  after  the  sheets  had  gone  to  press  I  was  compelled  to  reduce  Le 
Normand's  plate  of  it,  which  is  unsatisfactory,  but  answers  my  imme- 
diate purpose. 

The  enlarged  photographs  for  use  in  the  Lecture  Room  were  made 
for  me  with  most  successful  skill  by  Sergeant  Spackman,  of  South  Ken- 
sington ;  and  the  help  throughout  rendered  to  me  by  Mr.  Burgess  is 
acknowledged  in  the  course  of  the  Lectures  ;  though  with  thanks  which 
must  remain  inadequate  lest  they  should  become  tedious ;  for  Mr.  Bur- 
gess drew  the  subjects  of  Plates  III.,  X.,  and  XIII.  ;  drew  and  engraved 
every  woodcut  in  the  book ;  and  printed  all  the  plates  with  his  own 
hand. 


PREFACE. 


285 


Art,  except  in  cases  where  it  might  be  necessary  to  point  out 
some  undervalued  excellence.  The  objects  specified  in  the 
eleventh  paragraph  of  my  inaugural  Lecture,  might,  I  hoped, 
have  been  accomplished  without  reference  to  any  works  de- 
serving of  blame  ;  but  the  Exhibition  of  the  Royal  Academv 
in  the  present  year  showed  me  a  necessity  of  departing  from 
my  original  intention.  The  task  of  impartial  criticism  *  is 
now,  unhappily,  no  longer  to  rescue  modest  skill  from  neg- 
lect ;  but  to  withstand  the  errors  of  insolent  genius,  and  abate 
the  influence  of  plausible  mediocrity. 

The  Exhibition  of  1871  was  very  notable  in  this  important 
particular,  that  it  embraced  some  representation  of  the  mod- 
ern schools  of  nearly  every  country  in  Europe  :  aud  I  am  well 
assured  that  looking  back  upon  it  after  the  excitement  of  that 
singular  interest  has  passed  away,  every  thoughtful  judge  of 
Art  will  confirm  my  assertion,  that  it  contained  not  a  single 
picture  of  accomplished  merit  ;  while  it  contained  many  that 
were  disgraceful  to  Art,  and  some  that  were  disgraceful  to 
humanity. 

It  becomes,  under  such  circumstances,  my  inevitable  duty 
to  speak  of  the  existing  conditions  of  Art  with  plainness 
enough  to  guard  the  youths  whose  judgments  I  am  entrusted 
to  form,  from  being  misled,  either  by  their  own  naturally 
vivid  interest  in  wThat  represents,  however  unworthily,  the 
scenes  and  persons  of  their  own  day,  or  by  the  cunningly  de- 
vised, and,  without  doubt,  powerful  allurements  of  Art  which 
has  long  since  confessed  itself  to  have  no  other  object  than  to 
allure.  I  have,  therefore,  added  to  the  second  of  these  Lect- 
ures such  illustration  of  the  motives  and  course  of  modern 
industry  as  naturally  arose  out  of  its  subject,  and  shall  continue 

*  A  pamphlet  by  the  Earl  of  Southesk,  " Britain }s  Art  Paradise,''' 
(Edmonston  and  Douglas,  Edinburgh)  contains  an  entirely  admirable 
criticism  of  the  most  faultful  pictures  of  the  1871  Exhibition,  It  is  to 
be  regretted  that  Lord  Southesk  speaks  only  to  condemn  ;  but  indeed, 
in  my  own  three  days'  review  of  the  rooms,  I  found  nothing  deserving 
of  notice  otherwise,  except  Mr.  Hook's  always  pleasant  sketches  from 
fisher  life,  and  Mr.  Pettie's  graceful  and  powerful,  though  too  slightly 
painted,  study  from  Henry  VI. 


286 


PREFACE, 


in  future  to  make  similar  applications  ;  rarely,  indeed,  per* 
mitting  myself,  in  the  Lectures  actually  read  before  the 
University,  to  introduce  subjects  of  instant,  and  therefore  too 
exciting,  interest ;  but  completing  the  addresses  which  I  pre- 
pare for  publication  in  these,  and  in  any  other  particulars, 
which  may  render  them  more  widely  serviceable. 

The  present  course  of  Lectures  will  be  followed,  if  I  am 
able  to  fulfil  the  design  of  them,  by  one  of  a  like  elementary 
character  on  Architecture  ;  and  that  by  a  third  series  on 
Christian  Sculpture  :  but,  in  the  meantime,  my  effort  is  to 
direct  the  attention  of  the  resident  students  to  Natural  His- 
tory, and  to  the  higher  branches  of  ideal  Landscape  :  and  it 
will  be,  I  trust,  accepted  as  sufficient  reason  for  the  delay 
which  has  occurred  in  preparing  the  following  sheets  for  the 
press,  that  I  have  not  only  been  interrupted  by  a  dangerous 
illness,  but  engaged,  in  what  remained  to  me  of  the  summer, 
in  an  endeavour  to  deduce,  from  the  overwhelming  complexity 
of  modern  classification  in  the  Natural  Sciences,  some  forms 
capable  of  easier  reference  by  Art  students,  to  whom  the 
anatomy  of  brutal  and  floral  nature  is  often  no  less  important 
than  that  of  the  human  body. 

The  preparation  of  examples  for  manual  practice,  and  the 
arrangement  of  standards  for  reference,  both  in  Painting  and 
Sculpture,  had  to  be  carried  on  meanwhile,  as  I  was  able. 
For  what  has  already  been  done,  the  reader  is  referred  to  the 
Catalogue  of  the  .Educational  Series,  published  at  the  end  of 
the  Spring  Term  ;  of  what  remains  to  be  done  I  will  make  no 
anticipatory  statement,  being  content  to  have  ascribed  to  me 
rather  the  fault  of  narrowness  in  design,  than  of  extravagance 
in  expectation. 

Denmark  Hill, 

25th  November,  1871. 


ARATRA  PENTELIOI. 


LECTURE  £ 

OF    THE    DIVISION    OF  ARTS. 

November,  1870. 

1.  If,  as  is  commonly  believed,  the  subject  of  study  which 
it  is  my  special  function  to  bring  before  you  had  no  relation 
to  the  great  interests  of  mankind,  I  should  have  less  courage 
in  asking  for  your  attention  to-day,  than  when  I  first  addressed 
you  ;  though,  even  then,  I  did  not  do  so  without  painful  diffi- 
dence. For  at  this  moment,  even  supposing  that  in  other 
places  it  were  possible  for  men  to  pursue  their  ordinary  avo- 
cations undisturbed  by  indignation  or  pity  ;  here,  at  least,  in 
the  midst  of  the  deliberative  and  religious  influences  of  Eng- 
land, only  one  subject,  I  am  well  assured,  can  seriously  occupy 
your  thoughts — the  necessity,  namely,  of  determining  how  it 
has  come  to  pass,  that  in  these  recent  days,  iniquity  the  most 
reckless  and  monstrous  can  be  committed  unanimously, by  men 
more  generous  than  ever  yet  in  the  world's  history  were  de- 
ceived into  deeds  of  cruelty ;  and  that  prolonged  agony  of 
body  and  spirit,  such  as  we  should  shrink  from  inflicting  wil- 
fully on  a  single  criminal,  has  become  the  appointed  and  ac- 
cepted portion  of  unnumbered  multitudes  of  innocent  per- 
sons, inhabiting  the  districts  of  the  world  which,  of  all  others, 
as  it  seemed,  were  best  instructed  in  the  laws  of  civilization, 
and  most  richly  invested  with  the  honour,  and  indulged  in  the 
felicity,  of  peace. 

Believe  me,  however,  the  subject  of  Art— instead  of  being 


288 


AUATRA  PEN  TEL  1  Cl. 


foreign  to  these  deep  questions  of  social  duty  and  peril, — is 
so  vitally  connected  with  them,  that  it  would  be  impossible 
for  me  now  to  pursue  the  line  of  thought  in  which  I  began 
these  lectures,  because  so  ghastly  an  emphasis  would  be  given 
to  every  sentence  by  the  force  of  passing  events.  It  is  well, 
then,  that  in  the  plan  I  have  laid  down  for  your  study,  we 
shall  now  be  led  into  the  examination  of  technical  details,  or 
abstract  conditions  of  sentiment ;  so  that  the  hours  you  spend 
with  me  may  be  times  of  repose  from  heavier  thoughts.  But 
it  chances  strangely  that,  in  this  course  of  minutely  detailed 
study,  I  have  first  to  set  before  you  the  most  essential  piece 
of  human  workmanship,  the  plough,  at  the  very  moment  when 
— (you  may  see  the  announcement  in  the  journals  either  of 
yesterday  or  the  day  before) — the  swords  of  your  soldiers  have 
been  sent  for  to  be  sharpened,  and  not  at  all  to  be  beaten  into 
ploughshares.  I  permit  myself,  therefore,  to  remind  you  of 
the  watchword  of  all  my  earnest  writings — "Soldiers  of  the 
Ploughshare,  instead  of  Soldiers  of  the  Sword  " — and  I  know 
it  my  duty  to  assert  to  you  that  the  work  we  enter  upon  to-day 
is  no  trivial  one,  but  full  of  solemn  hope  ;  the  hope,  namely, 
that  among  you  there  may  be  found  men  wise  enough  to  lead 
the  national  passions  towards  the  arts  of  peace,  instead  of  the 
arts  of  war. 

I  say  the  work  "we  enter  upon,"  because  the  first  four  lect- 
ures I  gave  in  the  spring  were  wholly  prefatory  ;  and  the 
following  three  only  defined  for  you  methods  of  practice.  To- 
day we  begin  the  systematic  analysis  and  progressive  study  of 
our  subject. 

2.  In  general,  the  three  great,  or  fine,  Arts  of  Painting, 
Sculpture,  and  Architecture,  are  thought  of  as  distinct  from 
the  lower  and  more  mechanical  formative  arts,  such  as  car- 
pentry or  pottery.  But  we  cannot,  either  verbally,  or  with  any 
practical  advantage,  admit  such  classification.  How  are  wTe  to 
distinguish  painting  on  canvas  from  painting  on  china? — or 
painting  on  china  from  painting  on  glass? — or  painting  on 
glass  from  infusion  of  colour  into  any  vitreous  substance,  such 
as  enamel  ? — or  the  infusion  of  colour  into  glass  and  enamel 
from  the  infusion  of  colour  into  wool  or  silk,  and  weaving  of 


OF  THE  DIVISION  OF  ARTS. 


289 


pictures  in  tapestry,  or  patterns  in  dress  ?  You  will  find  that 
although,  in  ultimately  accurate  use  of  the  word,  painting 
must  be  held  to  mean  only  the  laying  of  a  pigment  on  a  surface 
with  a  soft  instrument ;  yet,  in  broad  comparison  of  the  func- 
tions of  Art,  we  must  conceive  of  one  and  the  same  great  artis- 
tic faculty,  as  governing  every  mode  of  disposing  colours  in  a 
permanent  relation  on,  or  in,  a  solid  substance ;  whether  it  be  by 
tinting  canvas,  or  dyeing  stuffs  ;  inlaying  metals  with  fused 
flint,  or  coating  walls  with  coloured  stone. 

3.  Similarly  the  word  "  Sculpture," — though  in  ultimate  ac- 
curacy it  is  to  be  limited  to  the  development  of  form  in  hard 
substances  by  cutting  away  portions  of  their  mass — in  broad 
definition,  must  be  held  to  signify  the  reduction  of  any  shape- 
less mass  of  solid  matter  into  an  intended  shape,  whatever  the 
consistence  of  the  substance,  or  nature  of  the  instrument  em- 
ployed ;  whether  we  carve  a  granite  mountain,  or  a  piece  of 
box-wood,  and  whether  we  use,  for  our  forming  instrument, 
axe,  or  hammer,  or  chisel,  or  our  own  hands,  or  water  to 
soften,  or  fire  to  fuse  ; — whenever  and  however  we  bring  a 
shapeless  thing  into  shape,  we  do  so  under  the  laws  of  the  one 
great  Art  of  Sculpture. 

4.  Having  thus  broadly  defined  painting  and  sculpture,  we 
shall  see  that  there  is,  in  the  third  place,  a  class  of  work  sep- 
arated from  both,  in  a  specific  manner,  and  including  a  great 
group  of  arts  which  neither,  of  necessity,  tint,  nor  for  the  sake 
of  form  merely,  shape,  the  substances  they  deal  with  ;  but  con- 
struct or  arrange  them  with  a  view  to  the  resistance  of  some 
external  force.  We  construct,  for  instance,  a  table  with  a  flat 
top,  and  some  support  of  prop,  or  leg,  proportioned  in  strength 
to  such  weights  as  the  table  is  intended  to  carry.  We  con- 
struct a  ship  out  of  planks,  or  plates  of  iron,  with  reference 
to  certain  forces  of  impact  to  be  sustained,  and  of  inertia  to  be 
overcome  ;  or  we  construct  a  wall  or  roof  with  distinct  refer- 
ence to  forces  of  pressure  and  oscillation,  to  be  sustained  or 
guarded  against ;  and  therefore,  in  every  case,  with  especial 
consideration  of  the  strength  of  our  materials,  and  the  nature 
of  that  strength,  elastic,  tenacious,  brittle,  and  the  like. 

Now  although  this  group  of  arts  nearly  always  involves  the 


290 


ARaTRA  PENT  ELI  CL 


putting  of  two  or  more  separate  pieces  together,  we  must  not 
define  it  by  that  accident.  The  blade  of  an  oar  is  not  less 
formed  with  reference  to  external  force  than  if  it  were  made 
of  many  pieces  ;  and  the  frame  of  a  boat,  whether  hollowed 
out  of  a  tree-trunk,  or  constructed  of  planks  nailed  together, 
is  essentially  the  same  piece  of  art  ;  to  be  judged  by  its 
buoyancy  and  capacity  of  progression.  Still,  from  the  most 
wonderful  piece  of  all  architecture,  the  human  skeleton,  to 
this  simple  one,*  the  ploughshare,  on  which  it  depends  for  its 
subsistence,  the  putting  of  two  or  more  pieces  together  is 
curiously  necessary  to  the  perfectness  of  every  fine  instru- 
ment ;  and  the  peculiar  mechanical  work  of  Dsedalus, — inlay- 
ing,— becomes  all  the  more  delightful  to  us  in  external  aspect, 
because,  as  in  the  jawbone  of  a  Saurian,  or  the  wood  of  a 
bow,  it  is  essential  to  the  finest  capacities  of  tension  and  re- 
sistance. 

5.  And  observe  how  unbroken  the  ascent  from  this,  the 
simplest  architecture,  to  the  loftiest.  The  placing  of  the 
timbers  in  a  ship's  stem,  and  the  laying  of  the  stones  in  a 
bridge  buttress,  are  similar  in  art  to  the  construction  of  the 
ploughshare,  differing  in  no  essential  point,  either  in  that  they 
deal  with  other  materials,  or  because,  of  the  three  things  pro- 
duced, one  has  to  divide  earth  by  advancing  through  it, 
another  to  divide  water  fey  advancing  through  it.  and  the 
third  to  divide  water  which  advances  against  it.  And  again, 
the  buttress  of  a  bridge  differs  only  from  that  of  a  cathedral 
in  having  less  weight  to  sustain,  and  more  to  resist.  We  can 
find  no  term  in  the  gradation,  from  the  ploughshare  to  the 
cathedral  buttress,  at  which  we  can  set  a  logical  distinction. 

6.  Thus  then  we  have  simply  three  divisions  of  Art — one, 
that  of  giving  colours  to  substance  ;  another,  that  of  giving 
form  to  it  without  question  of  resistance  to  force  ;  and  the 
third,  that  of  giving  form  or  position  which  will  make  it 
capable  of  such  resistance.    All  the  fine  arts  are  embraced 

*  I  had  a  real  ploughshare  on  my  lecture  table ;  but  it  would  inter- 
rupt the  drift  of  the  statements  in  the  text  too  long  if  I  attempted  here 
to  illustrate  by  figures  the  relation  of  the  coulter  to  the  share,  and  of  the 
hard  *o  the  soft  pieces  of  metal  in  the  share  itself. 


OF  THE  DIVISION  OF  ARTS. 


291 


under  these  three  divisions.  Do  not  think  that  it  is  only  a 
logical  or  scientific  affectation  to  mass  them  together  in  this 
manner  ;  it  is,  on  the  contrary,  of  the  first  practical  im- 
portance to  understand  that  the  painter's  faculty,  or  master- 
hood  over  colour,  being  as  subtle  as  a  musician's  over  sound, 
must  be  looked  to  for  the  government  of  every  operation  in 
which  colour  is  employed  ;  and  that,  in  the  same  manner,  the 
appliance  of  any  art  whatsoever  to  minor  objects  cannot  be 
right,  unless  under  the  direction  of  a  true  master  of  that  art. 
Under  the  present  system,  you  keep  your  Academician  occu- 
pied only  in  producing  tinted  pieces  of  canvas  to  be  shown  in 
frames,  and  smooth  pieces  of  marble  to  be  placed  in  niches  ; 
while  you  expect  your  builder  or  constructor  to  design 
coloured  patterns  in  stone  and  brick,  and  your  china-ware 
merchant  to  keep  a  separate  body  of  workwomen  who  can 
paint  china,  but  nothing  else.  By  this  division  of  labour,  you 
ruin  all  the  arts  at  once.  The  work  of  the  Academician  be- 
comes mean  and  effeminate,  because  he  is  not  used  to  treat 
colour  on  a  grand  scale  and  in  rough  materials  ;  and  your 
manufactures  become  base  because  no  well  educated  person 
sets  hand  to  them.  And  therefore  it  is  necessary  to  under- 
stand, not  merely  as  a  logical  statement,  but  as  a  practical 
necessity,  that  wherever  beautiful  colour  is  to  be  arranged, 
you  need  a  Master  of  Painting ;  and  wherever  noble  form  is 
to  be  given,  a  Master  of  Sculpture  ;  and  wherever  complex 
mechanical  force  is  to  be  resisted,  a  Master  of  Architecture. 

7.  But  over  this  triple  division  there  must  rule  another  yet 
more  important.  Any  of  these  three  arts  may  be  either 
imitative  of  natural  objects  or  limited  to  useful  appliance. 
You  may  either  paint  a  picture  that  represents  a  scene,  or 
your  street  door,  to  keep  it  from  rotting  ;  you  may  mould  a 
statue,  or  a  plate  ;  build  the  resemblance  of  a  cluster  of  lotus 
stalks,  or  only  a  square  pier.  Generally  speaking,  Painting 
and  Sculpture  will  be  imitative,  and  Architecture  merely 
useful  ;  but  there  is  a  great  deal  of  Sculpture — as  this  crystal 
ball  *  for  instance,  which  is  not  imitative,  and  a  great  deal  of 

*  A  sphere  of  rock  crystal,  cut  in  Japan,  enough  imaginable  by  the 
reader,  without  a  figure. 


292 


ABA  TEA  PENTELICL 


Architecture  which,  to  some  extent  is  so,  as  the  so  called  foils 
of  Gothic  apertures  ;  and  for  many  other  reasons  you  will  find 
it  necessary  to  keep  distinction  clear  in  your  minds  between 
the  arts — of  whatever  kind — which  are  imitative,  and  produce 
a  resemblance  or  image  of  something  which  is  not  present  ; 
and  those  which  are  limited  to  the  production  of  some  useful 
reality,  as  the  blade  of  a  knife,  or  the  wall  of  a  house.  You 
will  perceive  also,  as  we  advance,  that  sculpture  and  painting 
are  indeed  in  this  respect  only  one  art  ;  and  that  we  shall 
have  constantly  to  speak  and  think  of  them  as  simply  graphic, 
whether  with  chisel  or  colour,  their  principal  function  being 
to  make  us,  in  the  words  of  Aristotle,  "  dtupryriKQi  tov  ir^pi  ra 
o-^/xara  KaWovs  "  (Polit.  8,  3.),  "having  capacity  and  habit  of 
contemplation  of  the  beauty  that  is  in  material  things  ; "  while 
Architecture,  and  its  co-relative  arts,  are  to  be  practised  under 
quite  other  conditions  of  sentiment. 

8.  Now  it  is  obvious  that  so  far  as  the  fine  arts  consist 
either  in  imitation  or  mechanical  construction,  the  right  judg- 
ment of  them  must  depend  on  our  knowledge  of  the  things 
they  imitate,  and  forces  they  resist :  and  my  function  of 
teaching  here  would  (for  instance)  so  far  resolve  itself,  either 
into  demonstration  that  this  painting  of  a  peach,*  does  re- 
semble a  peach,  or  explanation  of  the  way  in  which  this 
ploughshare  (for  instance)  is  shaped  so  as  to  throw  the  earth 
aside  with  least  force  of  thrust.  And  in  both  of  these  methods 
of  study,  though  of  course  your  own  diligence  must  be  your 
chief  master,  to  a  certain  extent  your  Professor  of  Art  can 
always  guide  you  securely,  and  can  show  you,  either  that  the 
image  does  truly  resemble  what  it  attempts  to  resemble,  or 
that  the  structure  is  rightly  prepared  for  the  service  it  has  to 
perform.  But  there  is  yet  another  virtue  of  fine  art  which  is, 
perhaps,  exactly  that  about  which  you  will  expect  your  Pro- 
fessor to  teach  you  most,  and  which,  on  the  contrary,  is 
exactly  that  about  which  you  must  teach  yourselves  all  that 
it  is  essential  to  learn. 

9.  I  have  here  in  my  hand  one  of  the  simplest  possible 
f  One  of  William  Hunt's  peaches  ;  not,  I  am  afraid,  imaginable  alto- 
gether, but  still  less  representable  by  figure. 


OF  THE  DIVISION  OF  ARTS. 


293 


examples  of  the  union  of  the  graphic  and  constructive  pow- 
erS) — one  of  my  breakfast  plates.  Since  all  the  finely  archi- 
tectural arts,  we  said,  began  in  the  shaping  of  the  cup  and 
the  platter,  we  will  begin,  ourselves,  with  the  platter. 

Why  has  it  been  made  round  ?  For  two  structural  reasons : 
first,  that  the  greatest  holding  surface  may  be  gathered  into 
the  smallest  space  ;  and  secondly,  that  in  being  pushed  past 
other  things  on  the  table,  it  may  come  into  least  contact  with 
them. 


Tig.  1. 


Next,  why  has  it  a  rim  ?  For  two  other  structural  reasons ; 
first,  that  it  is  convenient  to  put  salt  or  mustard  upon  ;  but 
secondly  and  chiefly,  that  the  plate  may  be  easily  laid  hold  of. 
The  rim  is  the  simplest  form  of  continuous  handle. 

Farther,  to  keep  it  from  soiling  the  cloth,  it  will  be  wise  to 
put  this  ridge  beneath,  round  the  bottom  ;  for  as  the  rim  is 
the  simplest  possible  form  of  continuous  handle,  so  this  is  the 
simplest  form  of  continuous  leg.  And  we  get  the  section 
given  beneath  the  figure  for  the  essential  one  of  a  rightly 
made  platter. 


294 


AJIATRA  PENTELICL 


10.  Thus  far  our  art  has  been  strictly  utilitarian  having 
respect  to  conditions  of  collision,  of  carriage,  and  of  support. 
But  now,  on  the  surface  of  our  piece  of  pottery,  here  are  vari- 
ous bands  and  spots  of  colour  which  are  presumably  set  there 
to  make  it  pleasanter  to  the  eye.  Six  of  the  spots,  seen  closely, 
you  discover  are  intended  to  represent  flowers.  These  then 
have  as  distinctly  a  graphic  purpose  as  the  other  properties 
of  the  plate  have  an  architectural  one,  and  the  first  critical 
question  we  have  to  ask  about  them  is,  whether  they  are  like 
roses  or  not.  I  will  anticipate  wrhat  I  have  to  say  in  subse- 
quent lectures  so  far  as  to  assure  you  that,  if  they  are  to  be 
like  roses  at  all,  the  liker  they  can  be,  the  better.  Do  not 
suppose,  as  many  people  will  tell  you,  that  because  this  is  a 
common  manufactured  article,  your  roses  on  it  are  the  better 
for  being  ill-painted,  or  half-painted.  If  they  had  been  painted 
by  the  same  hand  that  did  this  peach,  the  plate  would  have 
been  all  the  better  for  it ;  but,  as  it  chanced,  there  was  no 
hand  such  as  William  Hunt's  to  paint  them,  and  their  graphic 
power  is  not  distinguished.  In  any  case,  however,  that  graphic 
power  must  have  been  subordinate  to  their  effect  as  pink 
spots,  while  the  band  of  green-blue  round  the  plate's  edge, 
and  the  spots  of  gold,  pretend  to  no  graphic  power  at  all,  but 
are  meaningless  spaces  of  colour  or  metal.  Still  less  have 
they  any  mechanical  office  :  they  add  nowise  to  the  service- 
ableness  of  the  plate  ;  and  their  agreeableness,  if  they  possess 
any,  depends,  therefore,  neither  on  any  imitative,  nor  any 
structural,  character  ;  but  on  some  inherent  pleasantness  in 
themselves,  either  of  mere  colours  to  the  eye  (as  of  taste  to 
the  tongue),  or  in  the  placing  of  those  colours  in  relations 
which  obey  some  mental  principle  of  order,  or  physical  prin- 
ciple of  harmony. 

11.  These  abstract  relations  and  inherent  pleasantnesses, 
whether  in  space,  number,  or  time,  and  whether  of  colours  or 
sounds,  form  what  we  may  properly  term  the  musical  or  har- 
monic element  in  every  art ;  and  the  study  of  them  is  an  en- 
tirely separate  science.  It  is  the  branch  of  art-philosophy  to 
which  the  word  "  aesthetics"  should  be  strictly  limited,  being 
the  inquiry  into  the  nature  of  things  that  in  themselves  are 


OF  THE  DIVISION  OF  ARTS. 


295 


pleasant  to  the  human  senses  or  instincts,  though  they  repre- 
sent nothing,  and  serve  for  nothing,  their  only  service  being 
their  pleasantness.  Thus  it  is  the  province  of  aesthetics  to 
tell  you,  (if  you  did  not  know  it  before,)  that  the  taste  and 
colour  of  a  peach  are  pleasant,  and  to  ascertain,  if  it  be  ascer- 
tainable, (and  you  have  any  curiosity  to  know,)  why  they  are  so. 

12.  The  information  would,  I  presume,  to  most  of  you,  be 
gratuitous.  If  it  were  not,  and  you  chanced  to  be  in  a  sick 
state  of  body  in  which  you  disliked  peaches,  it  would  be,  for 
the  time,  to  you  false  information,  and,  so  far  as  it  was  true 
of  other  people,  to  you  useless.  Nearly  the  whole  study  of 
aesthetics  is  in  like  manner  either  gratuitous  or  useless.  Either 
you  like  the  right  things  without  being  recommended  to  do 
so,  or  if  you  dislike  them,  your  mind  cannot  be  changed  by 
lectures  on  the  laws  of  taste.  You  recollect  the  story  of 
Thackeray,  provoked,  as  he  was  helping  himself  to  strawberries, 
by  a  young  coxcomb's  telling  him  that  "he  never  took  fruit 
or  sweets."  u  That  "  replied,  or  is  said  to  have  replied,  Thack- 
eray, "  is  because  you  are  a  sot,  and  a  glutton.7'  And  the 
whole  science  of  aesthetics  is,  in  the  depth  of  it,  expressed  by 
one  passage  of  Goethe's  in  the  end  of  the  2nd  part  of  Faust ; 
— the  notable  one  that  follows  the  song  of  the  Lemures,  when 
the  angels  enter  to  dispute  with  the  fiends  for  the  soul  of 
Faust.  They  enter  singing — "  Pardon  to  sinners  and  life 
to  the  dust."  Mephistopheles  hears  them  first,  and  exclaims 
to  his  troop,  " Discord  I  hear,  and  filthy  jingling " — "Mis- 
tone  hore  ich  ;  garstiges  Geklimper."  This,  you  see,  is  the 
extreme  of  bad  taste  in  music.  Presently  the  angelic  host 
begin  strewing  roses,  which  discomfits  the  diabolic  crowd  al- 
together. Mephistopheles  in  vain  calls  to  them — u  "What  do 
you  duck  and  shrink  for — is  that  proper  hellish  behaviour  ? 
Stand  fast,  and  let  them  strew  " — "  Was  cluckt  und  zuckt  ihr  ; 
ist  das  Hellen-brauch  ?  So  haitet  stand,  und  lasst  sie  streuen." 
There  you  have,  also,  the  extreme  of  bad  taste  in  sight  and 
smell.  And  in  the  whole  passage  is  a  brief  embodiment  for 
you  of  the  ultimate  fact  that  all  aesthetics  depend  on  the 
health  of  soul  and  body,  and  the  proper  exercise  of  both,  not 
only  through  years,  but  generations.    Only  by  harmony  of 


296 


ARATRA  PENTELICL 


both  collateral  and  successive  lives  can  the  great  doctrine  of 
the  Muses  be  received  which  enables  men  "  xaH*LV  opOu?" 
"  to  have  pleasures  rightly  ; "  and  there  is  no  other  definition 
of  the  beautiful,  nor  of  any  subject  of  delight  to  the  aesthetic 
faculty,  than  that  it  is  what  one  noble  spirit  has  created,  seen 
and  felt  by  another  of  similar  or  equal  nobility.  So  much  as 
there  is  in  you  of  ox,  or  of  swine,  perceives  no  beauty5  and 
creates  none  :  what  is  human  in  you,  in  exact  proportion  to 
the  perfectness  of  its  humanity,  can  create  it,  and  receive. 

13.  Returning  now  to  the  very  elementary  form  in  which 
the  appeal  to  our  aesthetic  virtue  is  made  in  our  breakfast- 
plate,  you  notice  that  there  are  two  distinct  kinds  of  pleasant- 
ness attempted.  One  by  hues  of  colour;  the  other  by  pro- 
portions of  space.  I  have  called  these  the  musical  elements 
of  the  arts  relating  to  sight ;  and  there  are  indeed  two  com- 
plete sciences,  one  of  the  combinations  of  colour,  and  the 
other  of  the  combinations  of  line  and  form,  which  might  each 
of  them  separately  engage  us  in  as  intricate  study  as  that  of 
the  science  of  music.  But  of  the  two,  the  science  of  colour  is, 
in  the  Greek  sense,  the  more  musical,  being  one  of  the  divis- 
ions of  the  Apolline  power  ;  and  it  is  so  practically  educa- 
tional, that  if  we  are  not  using  the  faculty  for  colour  to  dis- 
cipline nations,  they  will  infallibly  use  it  themselves  as  a 
means  of  corruption.  Both  music  and  colour  are  naturally 
influences  of  peace  ;  but  in  the  war  trumpet,  and  the  war 
shield,  in  the  battle  song  and  battle  standard,  they  have  con- 
centrated by  beautiful  imagination  the  cruel  passions  of  men  ; 
and  there  is  nothing  in  all  the  Divina  Commedia  of  history 
more  grotesque,  yet  more  frightful,  than  the  fact  that,  from 
the  almost  fabulous  period  when  the  insanity  and  impiety  of 
war  wrrote  themselves  in  the  symbols  of  the  shields  of  the 
Seven  against  Thebes,  colours  have  been  the  sign  and  stimu- 
lus of  the  most  furious  and  fatal  passions  that  have  rent  the 
nations  :  blue  against  green,  in  the  decline  of  the  Roman  Em- 
pire ;  black  against  white,  in  that  of  Florence  ;  red  against 
white,  in  the  wars  of  the  Royal  houses  in  England  ;  and  at 
this  moment,  red  against  white,  in  the  contest  of  anarchy  and 
loyalty,  in  all  the  world. 


OF  THE  DIVISION  OF  ARTS. 


297 


14.  On  the  other  hand,  the  directly  ethical  influence  of 
colour  in  the  sky,  the  trees,  flowers,  and  colouied  creatures 
round  us,  and  in  our  own  various  arts  massed  under  the  one 
name  of  painting,  is  so  essential  and  constant  that  we  cease  to 
recognize  it,  because  we  are  never  long  enough  altogether  de- 
prived of  it  to  feel  our  need ;  and  the  mental  diseases  induced 
by  the  influence  of  corrupt  colour  are  as  little  suspected,  or 
traced  to  their  true  source,  as  the  bodily  weaknesses  resulting 
from  atmospheric  miasmata. 

15.  The  second  musical  science  which  belongs  peculiarly  to 
sculpture  (and  to  painting,  so  far  as  it  represents  form),  con- 
sists in  the  disposition  of  beautiful  masses.  That  is  to  say, 
beautiful  surfaces  limited  by  beautiful  lines.  Beautiful  sur- 
faces, observe  ;  and  remember  what  is  noted  in  my  fourth  lect- 
ure of  the  difference  between  a  space  and  a  mass.  If  you 
have  at  any  time  examined  carefully,  or  practised  from,  the 
drawings  of  shells  placed  in  your  copying  series,  you  cannot 
but  have  felt  the  difference  in  the  grace  between  the  aspects 
of  the  same  line,  when  enclosing  a  rounded  or  unrounded 
space.  The  exact  science  of  sculpture  is  that  of  the  relations 
between  outline  and  the  solid  form  it  limits  ;  and  it  does  not 
matter  whether  that  relation  be  indicated  by  drawing  or  carv- 
ing, so  long  as  the  expression  of  solid  form  is  the  mental  pur- 
pose ;  it  is  the  science  always  of  the  beauty  of  relation  in  three 
dimensions.  To  take  the  simplest  possible  line  of  continuous 
limit — the  circle  :  the  flat  disc  enclosed  by  it  may  indeed  be 
made  an  element  of  decoration,  though  a  very  meagre  one  : 
but  its  relative  mass,  the  ball,  being  gradated  in  three  dimen- 
sions, is  always  delightful.  Here  *  is  at  once  the  simplest, 
and  in  mere  patient  mechanism,  the  most  skilful,  piece  of 
sculpture  I  can  possibly  show  you, — a  piece  of  the  purest 
rock-crystal,  chiselled,  (I  believe,  by  mere  toil  of  hand,)  into 
a  perfect  sphere.  Imitating  nothing,  constructing  nothing  ; 
sculpture  for  sculpture's  sake,  of  purest  natural  substance  into 
simplest  primary  form. 

16.  Again.  Out  of  the  nacre  of  any  mussel  or  oyster-shell 
you  might  cut,  at  your  pleasure,  any  quantity  of  small  flat  cir- 

*  The  crystal  ball  above  mentioned. 


son 


ARATIIA  PENTELIC1. 


cular  discs  of  the  prettiest  colour  and  lustre.  To  some  extent, 
such  tinsel  or  foil  of  shell  is  used  pleasantly  for  decoration. 
But  the  mussel  or  oyster  becoming  itself  an  unwilling  model* 
ler,  agglutinates  its  juice  into  three  dimensions,  and  the  fact 
of  the  surface  being  now  geometrically  gradated,  together 
with  the  savage  instinct  of  attributing  value  to  what  is  diffi- 
cult to  obtain,  make  the  little  boss  so  precious  in  men's  sight- 
that  wise  eagerness  of  search  for  the  kingdom  of  heaven  can 
be  likened  to  their  eagerness  of  search  for  it  ;  and  the  gates 
of  Paradise  can  be  no  otherwise  rendered  so  fair  to  their  poor 
intelligence,  as  by  telling  them  that  every  several  gate  was  of 
"  one  pearl." 

17.  But  take  note  here.  We  have  just  seen  that  the  sum  of 
the  perceptive  faculty  is  expressed  in  those  words  of  Aristotle's 
"  to  take  pleasure  rightly  "  or  straightly — xai'PCiV  °p6us.  Now, 
it  is  not  possible  to  do  the  direct  opposite  of  that, — to  take 
pleasure  iniquitously  or  obliquely — xat'pea/  ^StKws  or  crKoXtm— 
more  than  you  do  in  enjoying  a  thing  because  your  neighbour 
cannot  get  it.  You  may  enjoy  a  thing  legitimately  because  it 
is  rare,  and  cannot  be  seen  often,  (as  you  do  a  fine  aurora,  or 
a  sunset,  or  an  unusually  lovely  flower)  ;  that  is  Nature's  way 
of  stimulating  your  attention.  But  if  you  enjoy  it  because 
your  neighbour  cannot  have  it — and,  remember,  all  value  at- 
tached to  pearls  more  than  glass  beads,  is  merely  and  purely 
for  that  cause, — then  you  rejoice  through  the  worst  of  idola- 
tries, covetousness  ;  and  neither  arithmetic,  nor  writing,  nor 
any  other  so-called  essential  of  education,  is  now  so  vitally  nec- 
essary to  the  population  of  Europe,  as  such  acquaintance 
with  the  principles  of  intrinsic  value,  as  may  result  in  the 
iconoclasm  of  jewellery  ;  and  in  the  clear  understanding  that 
we  are  not  in  that  instinct,  civilized,  but  yet  remain  wholly 
savage,  so  far  as  we  care  for  display  of  this  selfish  kind. 

You  think,  perhaps,  I  am  quitting  my  subject,  and  proceed- 
ing, as  it  is  too  often  with  appearance  of  justice  alleged  against 
me,  into  irrelevant  matter.  Pardon  me  ;  the  end,  not  only  of 
these  lectures,  but  of  my  whole  professorship,  would  be  ac- 
complished—and far  more  than  that,— if  only  the  English 
nation  could  be  made  to  understand  that  the  beauty  which  ia 


OF  THE  DIVISION  OF  ARTS. 


299 


indeed  to  be  a  joy  for  ever,  must  be  a  joy  for  all ;  and  that 
though  the  idolatry  may  not  have  been  wholly  divine  which 
sculptured  gods,  the  idolatry  is  wholly  diabolic,  which,  for 
vulgar  display,  sculptures  diamonds. 

18.  To  go  back  to  the  point  under  discussion.  A  pearl,  or 
a  glass  bead,  may  owe  its  pleasantness  in  some  degree  to  its 
lustre  as  well  as  to  its  roundness.  But  a  mere  and  simple 
ball  of  unpolished  stone  is  enough  for  sculpturesque  value. 
You  may  have  noticed  that  the  quatrefoil  used  in  the  Ducal 
Palace  of  Venice  owes  its  complete  loveliness  in  distant  effect 
to  the  finishing  of  its  cusps.  The  extremity  of  the  cusp  is  a 
mere  ball  of  Istrian  marble  ;  and  consider  how  subtle  the 
faculty  of  sight  must  be,  since  it  recognizes  at  any  distance, 
and  is  gratified  by,  the  mystery  of  the  termination  of  cusp  ob- 
tained by  the  gradated  light  on  the  ball. 

In  that  Venetian  tracery  this  simplest  element  of  sculptured 
form  is  used  sparingly,  as  the  most  precious  that  can  be  em- 
ployed to  finish  the  facade.  But  alike  in  our  own,  and  the 
French,  central  Gothic,  the  ball-flower  is  lavished  on  every 
line — and  in  your  St.  Mary's  spire,  and  the  Salisbury  spire, 
and  the  towers  of  Notre  Dame  of  Paris,  the  rich  pleasantness 
of  decoration, — indeed,  their  so-called  "  decorated  style,5' — 
consists  only  in  being  daintily  beset  with  stone  balls.  It  is 
true  the  balls  are  modified  into  dim  likeness  of  flowers  ;  but 
do  you  trace  the  resemblance  to  the  rose  in  their  distant,  which 
is  their  intended  effect  ? 

19.  Bat  farther,  let  the  ball  have  motion  ;  then  the  form  it 
generates  will  be  that  of  a  cylinder.  You  have,  perhaps, 
thought  that  pure  Early  English  Architecture  depended  for 
its  charm  on  visibility  of  construction.  It  depends  for  its 
charm  altogether  on  the  abstract  harmony  of  groups  of  cylin- 
ders,* arbitrarily  bent  into  mouldings,  and  arbitrarily  associ- 

*  All  grandest  effects  in  mouldings  may  be,  and  for  the  most  part 
have  been,  obtained  by  rolls  and  cavettos  of  circular  (segmental)  sec- 
tion. More  refined  sections,  as  that  of  the  fluting  of  a  Doric  shaft,  are 
only  of  use  near  the  eye  and  in  beautiful  stone  ;  and  the  pursuit  of  them 
was  one  of  the  many  errors  of  later  Gothic.  The  statement  in  the  text 
that  the  mouldings,  even  of  best  time,  "have  no  real  relation  to  con- 


300 


ARAT11A  VENT  ELI  CI. 


ated  as  shafts,  having  no  real  relation  to  construction  whatso- 
ever, and  a  theoretical  relation  so  subtle  that  none  of  us  had 
seen  it,  till  Professor  Willis  worked  it  out  for  us. 

20.  And  now,  proceeding  to  analysis  of  higher  sculpture, 
you  may  have  observed  the  importance  I  have  attached  to  the 
porch  of  San  Zenone,  at  Verona,  by  making  it,  among  your 
standards,  the  first  of  the  group  which  is  to  illustrate  the  sys- 
tem of  sculpture  and  architecture  founded  on  faith  in  a  future 
life.  That  porch,  fortunately  represented  in  the  photograph, 
from  which  Plate  I.  has  been  engraved,  under  a  clear  and 
pleasant  light,  furnishes  you  with  examples  of  sculpture  of 
every  kind  from  the  flattest  incised  bas-relief  to  solid  statues, 
both  in  marble  and  bronze.  And  the  two  points  I  have  been 
pressing  upon  you  are  conclusively  exhibited  here,  namely, — 
(1).  That  sculpture  is  essentially  the  production  of  a  pleasant 
bossiness  or  roundness  of  surface  ;  (2)  that  the  pleasantness  of 
that  bossy  condition  to  the  eye  is  irrespective  of  imitation  on 
one  side,  and  of  structure  on  the  other. 

21.  (1.)  Sculpture  is  essentially  the  production  of  a  pleasant 
bossiness  or  roundness  of  surface. 

If  you  look  from  some  distance  at  these  two  engravings  of 
Greek  coins,  (place  the  book  open  so  that  you  can  see  the  op- 
posite plate  three  or  four  yards  off,)  you  will  find  the  relief  on 
each  of  them  simplifies  itself  into  a  pearl-like  portion  of  a 
sphere,  with  exquisitely  gradated  light  on  its  surface.  When 
you  look  at  them  nearer,  you  will  see  that  each  smaller  por- 
tion into  which  they  are  divided— cheek,  or  brow,  or  leaf,  or 
tress  of  hair — resolves  itself  also  into  a  rounded  or  undulated 
surface,  pleasant  by  gradation  of  light.  Every  several  sur- 
face is  delightful  in  itself,  as  a  shell,  or  a  tuft  of  rounded 
moss,  or  the  bossy  masses  of  distant  forest  would  be.  That 
these  intricately  modulated  masses  present  some  resemblance 
to  a  girl's  face,  such  as  the  Syracusans  imagined  that  of  the 
water-goddess  Arethusa,  is  entirely  a  secondary  matter ;  the 

struction,"  is  scarcely  strong  enough  :  they  in  fact  contend  with,  and 
deny  the  construction,  their  principal  purpose  seeming  t<?  be  the  con- 
cealment of  the  joints  of  the  voussoirs. 


Plate  I. — Porch  of  San  Zenone.  Verona. 


OF  THE  DIVISION  OF  ARTS. 


301 


primary  condition  is  that  the  masses  shall  be  beautifully 
rounded,  and  disposed  with  due  discretion  and  order. 

22.  (2.)  It  is  difficult  for  you,  at  first,  to  feel  this  order  and 
beauty  of  surface,  apart  from  the  imitation.  But  you  can  see 
there  is  a  pretty  disposition  of,  and  relation  between,  the  pro- 
jections of  a  fir-cone,  though  the  studded  spiral  imitates  noth- 
ing. Order  exactly  the  same  in  kind,  only  much  more  com- 
plex ;  and  an  abstract  beauty  of  surface  rendered  definite  by- 
increase  and  decline  of  light — (for  every  curve  of  surface  has 
its  own  luminous  law,  and  the  light  and  shade  on  a  parabolic 
solid  differs,  specifically,  from  that  on  an  elliptical  or  spheri- 
cal one) — it  is  the  essential  business  of  the  sculptor  to  obtain  ; 
as  it  is  the  essential  business  of  a  painter  to  get  good  colour, 
whether  he  imitates  anything  or  not.  At  a  distance  from  the 
picture,  or  carving,  where  the  things  represented  become  ab- 
solutely unintelligible,  we  must  yet  be  able  to  say,  at  a  glance, 
"  That  is  good  painting,  or  good  carving." 

And  you  will  be  surprised  to  find,  when  you  try  the  ex- 
periment, how  much  the  eye  must  instinctively  judge  in  this 
manner.  Take  the  front  of  San  Zenone  for  instance,  Plate  I. 
You  will  find  it  impossible  without  a  lens,  to  distinguish  in 
the  bronze  gates,  and  in  great  part  of  the  wall,  anything  that 
their  bosses  represent.  You  cannot  tell  whether  the  sculpture 
is  of  men,  animals,  or  trees  ;  only  you  feel  it  to  be  composed 
of  pleasant  projecting  masses  ;  you  acknowledge  that  both 
gates  and  wall  are,  somehow,  delightfully  roughened  ;  and 
only  afterwards,  by  slow  degrees,  can  you  make  out  what  this 
roughness  means  ;  nay,  though  here  (Plate  III.)  I  magnify* 
one  of  the  bronze  plates  of  the  gate  to  a  scale,  which  gives 
you  the  same  advantage  as  if  you  saw  it  quite  close,  in  the 
reality, — you  may  still  be  obliged  to  me  for  the  information, 
that  this  boss  represents  the  Madonna  asleep  in  her  little  bed, 
and  this  smaller  boss,  the  Infant  Christ  in  His  ;  and  this  at 

*  Some  ol  the  most  precious  work  done  for  me  by  my  assistant  Mr. 
Burgess,  during  the  course  of  these  lectures,  consisted  in  making  en- 
larged drawings  from  portions  of  photographs,  Plate  III.  is  engraved 
from  a  drawing  of  his,  enlarged  from  the  original  photograph  of  which 
Plate  I.  is  a  reduction. 


302 


ARATRA  PENTELICL 


the  top,  a  cloud  with  an  angel  coming  out  of  it,  and  these 
jagged  bosses,  two  of  the  Three  Kings,  with  their  crowns  on, 
looking  up  to  the  star,  (which  is  intelligible  enough  I  admit)  ; 
but  what  this  straggling,  three-legged  boss  beneath  signifies, 
I  suppose  neither  you  nor  I  can  tell,  unless  it  be  the  shep- 
herd's dog,  who  has  come  suddenly  upon  the  Kings  with  their 
crowns  on,  and  is  greatly  startled  at  them. 

23.  Farther,  and  much  more  definitely,  the  pleasantness  of 
the  surface  decoration  is  independent  of  structure  ;  that  is  to 
say,  of  any  architectural  requirement  of  stability.  The  greater 
part  of  the  sculpture  here  is  exclusively  ornamentation  of  a 
flat  wall,  or  of  door  panelling  ;  only  a  small  portion  of  the 
church  front  is  thus  treated,  and  the  sculpture  has  no  more  to 
do  with  the  form  of  the  building  than  a  piece  of  a  lace  veil 
would  have,  suspended  beside  its  gates  on  a  festal  day  ;  the 
proportions  of  shaft  and  arch  might  be  altered  in  a  hundred 
different  ways,  without  diminishing  their  stability ;  and  the 
pillars  would  stand  more  safely  on  the  ground  than  on  the 
backs  of  these  carved  animals. 

24.  I  wish  you  especially  to  notice  these  points,  because  the 
false  theory  that  ornamentation  should  be  merely  decorated 
structure  is  so  pretty  and  plausible,  that  it  is  likely  to  take 
away  your  attention  from  the  far  more  important  abstract 
conditions  of  design.  Structure  should  never  be  contradicted, 
and  in  the  best  buildings  it  is  pleasantly  exhibited  and  en- 
forced ;  in  this  very  porch  the  joints  of  every  stone  are  visible, 
and  you  will  find  me  in  the  Fifth  Lecture  insisting  on  this 
clearness  of  its  anatomy  as  a  merit ;  yet  so  independent  is  the 
mechanical  structure  of  the  true  design,  that  when  I  begin  my 
Lectures  on  Architecture,  the  first  building  I  shall  give  you  as 
a  standard  will  be  one  in  which  the  structure  is  wholly  con- 
cealed. It  will  be  the  Baptistry  of  Florence,  which  is,  in  reality, 
as  much  a  buttressed  chapel  with  a  vaulted  roof,  as  the  Chap- 
ter House  of  York — but  round  it,  in  order  to  conceal  that 
buttressed  structure,  (not  to  decorate,  observe,  but  to  conceal) 
a  flat  external  wall  is  raised  ;  simplifying  the  whole  to  a  mere 
hexagonal  box,  like  a  wooden  piece  of  Tunbridge  ware,  on  the 
surface  of  which  the  eye  and  intellect  are  to  be  interested  by 


Plate  II. — The  Arethusa  of  Syracuse. 


OF  THE  DIVISION  OF  ARTS. 


303 


the  relations  of  dimension  and  curve  between  pieces  of  en- 
crusting marble  of  different  colours,  which  have  no  more  to 
do  with  the  real  make  of  the  building  than  the  diaper  of  a 
Harlequin's  jacket  has  to  do  with  his  bones. 

25.  The  sense  of  abstract  proportion,  on  which  the  enjoy- 
ment of  such  a  piece  of  art  entirely  depends,  is  one  of  the 
aesthetic  faculties  which  nothing  can  develop  but  time  and 
education.  It  belongs  only  to  highly-trained  nations  ;  and, 
among  them,  to  their  most  strictly  refined  classes,  though  the 
germs  of  it  are  found,  as  part  of  their  innate  power,  in  every 
people  capable  of  art.  It  has  for  the  most  part  vanished  at 
present  from  the  English  mind,  in  consequence  of  our  eager 
desire  for  excitement,  and  for  the  kind  of  splendour  that  ex- 
hibits wealth,  careless  of  dignity  ;  so  that,  I  suppose,  there 
are  very  few  now  even  of  our  best-trained  Londoners  who 
know  the  difference  between  the  design  of  Whitehall  and  that 
of  any  modern  club-house  in  Pall-mall.  The  order  and  har- 
mony which,  in  his  enthusiastic  account  of  the  Theatre  of 
Epidaurus,  Pausanias  insists  on  before  beauty,  can  only  be 
recognized  by  stern  order  and  harmony  in  our  daily  lives  ;  and 
the  perception  of  them  is  as  little  to  be  compelled,  or  taught 
suddenly,  as  the  laws  of  still  finer  choice  in  the  conception  of 
dramatic  incident  which  regulate  poetic  sculpture. 

26.  And  now,  at  last,  I  think,  we  can  sketch  out  the  sub- 
ject before  us  in  a  clear  light.  "We  have  a  structural  art, 
divine,  and  human,  of  which  the  investigation  conies  under 
the  general  term,  Anatomy  ;  whether  the  junctions  or  joints 
be  in  mountains,  or  in  branches  of  trees,  or  in  buildings,  or 
in  bones  of  animals.  We  have  next  a  musical  art,  falling  into 
two  distinct  divisions — one  using  colours,  the  other  masses, 
for  its  elements  of  composition  ;  lastly,  we  have  an  imitative 
art,  concerned  with  the  representation  of  the  outward  appear- 
ances of  things.  And,  for  many  reasons,  I  think  it  best  to 
begin  with  imitative  Sculpture  ;  that  being  defined  as  the  art 
which,  by  the  musical  disposition  of  masses,  imitates  anything  of 
which  the  imitation  is  justly  pleasant  to  us  ;  and  does  so  in  ac- 
cordance with  structural  laws  having  due  reference  to  the  ma- 
terials employed. 


301 


All  Alii  A  PENT  ELI  CI. 


So  that  you  see  our  task  will  involve  the  immediate  inquiry 
what  the  things  are  of  which  the  imitation  is  justly  pleasant 
to  us  :  what,  in  few  words, — if  we  are  to  be  occupied  in  the 
making  of  graven  images — we  ought  to  like  to  make  images 
of.  Secondly,  after  having  determined  its  subject,  what  degree 
of  imitation  or  likeness  we  ought  to  desire  in  our  graven 
image ;  and  lastly,  under  what  limitations  demanded  by 
structure  and  material,  such  likeness  may  be  obtained. 

These  inquiries  I  shall  endeavour  to  pursue  with  you  to 
some  practical  conclusion,  in  my  next  four  lectures,  and  in  the 
sixth,  I  will  briefly  sketch  the  actual  facts  that  have  taken 
place  in  the  development  of  sculpture  by  the  two  greatest 
schools  of  it  that  hitherto  have  existed  in  the  world. 

27.  The  tenor  of  our  next  lecture  then  must  be  an  inquiry 
into  the  real  nature  of  Idolatry ;  that  is  to  say,  the  invention 
and  service  of  Idols  :  and,  in  the  interval,  may  I  commend  to 
your  own  thoughts  this  question,  not  wholly  irrelevant,  yet 
which  I  cannot  pursue ;  namely,  whether  the  God  to  whom 
we  have  so  habitually  prayed  for  deliverance  "  from  battle, 
murder,  and  sudden  death,"  is  indeed,  seeing  that  the  present 
state  of  Christendom  is  the  result  of  a  thousand  years'  pray- 
ing to  that  effect,  "as  the  gods  of  the  heathen  who  were  but 
idols  ; "  or  whether — (and  observe,  one  or  other  of  these  things 
must  be  true) — whether  our  prayers  to  Him  have  been,  by 
this  much,  worse  than  Idolatry  ;— that  heathen  prayer  was  true 
prayer  to  false  gods  ;  and  our  prayers  have  been  false  prayers 
to  the  True  One. 


LECTUBE  II 

IDOLATRY. 

November,  1870. 

28.  Beginning  with  the  simple  conception  of  sculpture  as 
the  art  of  fiction  in  solid  substance,  we  are  now  to  consider 
what  its  subjects  should  be.  What — having  the  gift  of  imag- 
ery— should  we  by  preference  endeavour  to  image  ?    A  ques- 


IDOLATRY. 


305 


tion  which  is,  indeed,  subordinate  to  the  deeper  one— why 
we  should  wish  to  image  anything  at  all. 

29.  Some  years  ago,  having  been  always  desirous  that  the 
education  of  women  should  begin  in  learning  how  to  cook,  I 
got  leave,  one  day,  for  a  little  girl  of  eleven  years  old  to  ex- 
change, much  to  her  satisfaction,  her  schoolroom  for  the 
kitchen.  But  as  ill  fortune  would  have  it,  there  was  some 
pastry  toward,  and  she  was  left  unadvisedly  in  command  of 
some  delicately  rolled  paste  ;  whereof  she  made  no  pies,  but 
an  unlimited  quantity  of  cats  and  mice. 

Now  you  may  read  the  works  of  the  gravest  critics  of  art 
from  end  to  end  ;  but  you  will  find,  at  last,  they  can  give  you 
no  other  true  account  of  the  spirit  of  sculpture  than  that  it  is 
an  irresistible  human  instinct  for  the  making  of  cats  and  mice, 
and  other  imitable  living  creatures,  in  such  permanent  form 
that  one  may  play  with  the  images  at  leisure. 

Play  with  them,  or  love  them,  or  fear  them,  or  worship 
them.  The  cat  may  become  the  goddess  Pasht,  and  the 
mouse,  in  the  hand  of  the  sculptured  king,  enforce  his  endur- 
ing words  "  h  e/xe  rts  0/36(01/  euo-efirjs  ccttoj  ; "  but  the  great 
mimetic  instinct  underlies  all  such  purpose;  and  is zoopiastic, 
— life-shaping, — alike  in  the  reverent  and  the  impious. 

30.  Is,  I  say,  and  has  been,  hitherto  ;  none  of  us  dare  say 
that  it  will  be.  I  shall  have  to  show  you  hereafter  that  the 
greater  part  of  the  technic  energy  of  men,  as  yet,  has  indi- 
cated a  kind  of  childhood  ;  and  that  the  race  becomes,  if  not 
more  wise,  at  least  more  manly, *  with  every  gained  century. 
I  can  fancy  that  all  this  sculpturing  and  painting  of  ours  may 
be  looked  back  upon,  in  some  distant  time,  as  a  kind  of  doll- 
making,  and  that  the  words  of  Sir  Isaac  Newton  may  be 
smiled  at  no  more  :  only  it  will  not  be  for  stars  that  we  desert 
our  stone  dolls,  but  for  men.  When  the  day  comes,  as  come 
it  must,  in  which  we  no  more  deface  and  defile  God's  image 
in  living  clay,  I  am  not  sure  that  we  shall  any  of  us  care  so 
much  for  the  images  made  of  Him,  in  burnt  clay. 

31.  But,  hitherto,  the  energy  of  growth  in  any  people  may 
be  almost  directly  measured  by  their  passion  for  imitative  art ; 

*  Glance  forward  at  once  to  §  75,  read  it,  and  return  to  this. 


306 


ABATE  A  PENTRLICL 


namely,  for  sculpture,  or  for  the  drama,  which  is  living  and 
speaking  sculpture,  or,  as  in  Greece,  for  both  ;  and  in  national 
as  in  actual  childhood,  it  is  not  merely  the  making,  but  the 
making-believe  ;  not  merely  the  acting  for  the  sake  of  the 
scene,  but  acting  for  the  sake  of  acting,  that  is  delightful. 
And,  of  the  two  mimetic  arts,  the  drama,  being  more  passion- 
ate, and  involving  conditions  of  greater  excitement  and  lux 
ury,  is  usually  in  its  excellence  the  sign  of  culminating 
strength  in  the  people  ;  while  fine  sculpture,  requiring  always 
submission  to  severe  lav/,  is  an  unfailing  proof  of  their  being 
in  early  and  active  progress.  There  is  no  instance  of  fine 
sculpture  being  produced  by  a  nation  either  torpid,  iveak,  or  in 
decadence.  Their  drama  may  gain  in  grace  and  wit ;  but  their 
sculpture,  in  days  of  decline,  is  always  base. 

32.  If  my  little  lady  in  the  kitchen  had  been  put  in  com- 
mand of  colours,  as  well  as  of  dough,  and  if  the  paste  would 
have  taken  the  colours,  wTe  may  be  sure  her  mice  would  have 
been  painted  brown,  and  her  cats  tortoise-shell ;  and  this, 
partly  indeed  for  the  added  delight  and  prettiness  of  colour 
itself,  but  more  for  the  sake  of  absolute  realization  to  her 
eyes  and  mind.  Now  all  the  early  sculpture  of  the  most  ac- 
complished nations  has  been  thus  coloured,  rudely  or  finely  ; 
and,  therefore,  you  see  at  once  now  necessary  it  is  that  we 
should  keep  the  term  "  graphic  "  for  imitative  art  generally  ; 
since  no  separation  can  at  first  be  made  between  carving  and 
painting,  with  reference  to  the  mental  powers  exerted  in,  or 
addressed  by,  them.  In  the  earliest  known  art  of  the  world, 
a  reindeer  hunt  may  be  scratched  in  outline  on  the  flat  side 
of  a  clean-picked  bone,  and  a  reindeer's  head  carved  out  of 
the  end  of  it ;  both  these  are  flint-knife  work,  and,  strictly 
speaking,  sculpture  :  but  the  scratched  outline  is  the  begin- 
ning of  drawing,  and  the  carved  head  of  sculpture  proper. 
When  the  spaces  enclosed  by  the  scratched  outline  are  filled 
with  colour,  the  colouring  soon  becomes  a  principal  means  01 
effect  ;  so  that,  in  the  engraving  of  an  Egyptian-colour  bas- 
relief  (S.  101),  Rosellini  has  been  content  to  miss  the  outlin- 
ing incisions  altogether,  and  represent  it  as  a  painting  only. 
Its  proper  definition  is,  "painting  accented  by  sculpture;'' 


IDOLATRY. 


307 


on  the  other  hand,  in  solid  coloured  statues, — Dresden  china 
figures,  for  example, — we  have  pretty  sculpture  accented  by 
painting ;  the  mental  purpose  in  both  kinds  of  art  being  to 
obtain  the  utmost  degree  of  realization  possible,  and  the 
ocular  impression  being  the  same,  whether  the  delineation  is 
obtained  by  engraving  or  painting.  For,  as  I  pointed  out  to 
you  in  my  fifth  lecture,  everything  is  seen  by  the  eye  at 
patches  of  colour,  and  of  colour  only  ;  a  fact  which  the  Greeks 
knew  well ;  so  that  when  it  becomes  a  question  in  the  dialogue 
of  Minos,  "  tlvl  ovtl  rfj  6\p€i  bpaTOLi  ra  6pa>//.ei/-a,"  the  answer  is 

" aicrOr}(r€.L  ravTrj  rrj  Sia  rCv  6<f>6a\jjiQ>v  8rj\oLcrrj  y)jj,iv  tol  ypu')- 

p.ra." — "What  bind  of  power  is  the  sight  with  which  we  see 
things  ?  It  is  that  sense  which,  through  the  eyes,  can  reveal 
colours  to  us." 

33.  And  now  observe  that  while  the  graphic  arts  begin  in 
the  mere  mimetic  effort,  they  proceed,  as  they  obtain  more 
perfect  realization,  to  act  under  the  influence  of  a  stronger 
and  higher  instinct.  They  begin  by  scratching  the  reindeer, 
the  most  interesting  object  of  sight.  But  presently,  as  the 
human  creature  rises  in  scale  of  intellect,  it  proceeds  to  scratch, 
not  the  most  interesting  object  of  sight  only,  but  the  most  in- 
teresting object  of  imagination  ;  not  the  reindeer,  but  the 
Maker  and  Giver  of  the  reindeer.  And  the  second  great  condi- 
tion for  the  advance  of  the  art  of  sculpture  is  that  the  race  should 
possess,  in  addition  to  the  mimetic  instinct,  the  realistic  or 
idolizing  instinct ;  the  desire  to  see  as  substantial  the  powers 
that  are  unseen,  and  bring  near  those  that  are  far  off,  and  to 
possess  and  cherish  those  that  are  strange.  To  make  in  some 
way  tangible  and  visible  the  nature  of  the  gods — to  illustrate 
and  explain  it  by  symbols  ;  to  bring  the  immortals  out  of  the 
recesses  of  the  clouds,  and  make  them  Penates  ;  to  bring  back 
the  dead  from  darkness,  and  make  them  Lares. 

34.  Our  conception  of  this  tremendous  and  universal  human 
passion  has  been  altogether  narrowed  by  the  current  idea  that 
Pagan  religious  art  consisted  only,  or  chiefly,  in  giving  person- 
ality to  the  gods.  The  personality  was  never  doubted  ;  it  was 
visibility,  interpretation,  and  possession  that  the  hearts  of 
men  sought.    Possession,  first  of  all — the  getting  hold  of 


308 


ARATRA  PENTELICI. 


some  hewn  log  of  wild  olive-wood  that  would  fall  on  its  knees 
if  it  was  pulled  from  its  pedestal — and,  afterwards,  slowly 
clearing  manifestation  ;  the  exactly  right  expression  is  used 
in  Lucian's  dream, — <£>€(.oY-x9  eo'et^e  rov  A/«  ;  "  Showed  **  Zeus  ;,J 
manifested  him,  nay,  in  a  certain  sense,  brought  forth,  01 
created,  as  you  have  it,  in  Anacreon's  ode  to  the  Eose,  of  the 
birth  of  Athena  herself — 

TroXdfLOKXoVOV   T  *A6yJV7]V 

But  I  will  translate  the  passage  from  Lucian  to  you  at  length 
— it  is  in  every  way  profitable. 

35.  "  There  came  to  me,  in  the  healing  f  night,  a  divine 
dream,  so  clear  that  it  missed  nothing  of  the  truth  itself  ;  yes, 
and  still  after  all  this  time,  the  shapes  of  what  I  sawT  remain 
ill  my  sight,  and  the  sound  of  what  I  heard  dwells  in  my 
ears  " — (note  the  lovely  sense  of  Zvavkos— the  sound  being  as 
of  a  stream  passing  always  by  in  the  same  channel, — "  so  dis- 
tinct was  everything  to  me.  Two  women  laid  hold  of  my 
hands  and  pulled  me,  each  towards  herself,  so  violently,  that 
I  had  like  to  have  been  pulled  asunder  ;  and  they  cried  out 
against  one  another, — the  one,  that  she  v/as  resolved  to  have 
me  to  herself,  being  indeed  her  own,  and  the  other  that  it  was 
vain  for  her  to  claim  what  belonged  to  others  ; — and  the  one 
who  first  claimed  me  for  her  own  was  like  a  hard  worker,  and 
hid  strength  as  a  man's  ;  and  her  hair  was  dusty,  and  her 
hand  full  of  horny  places,  and  her  dress  fastened  tight  about 
her,  and  the  folds  of  it  loaded  with  white  marble-dust,  so  that 
she  looked  just  as  my  uncle  used  to  look  when  he  was  filing 
stones  :  but  the  other  was  pleasant  in  features,  and  delicate  in 
form,  and  orderly  in  her  dress  ;  and  so  in  the  end,  they  left 

*  There  is  a  primary  and  vulgar  sense  of  "exhibited''  in  Lucian's 
mind  ;  but  the  higher  meaning  is  involved  in  it. 

f  In  the  Greek,  "  ambrosial."  Recollect  always  that  ambrosia,  as  food 
of  gods,  is  the  continual  restorer  of  strength  ;  that  all  food  is  ambrosial 
when  it  nourishes,  and  that  the  night  is  called  ''ambrosial  "  because  it 
restores  strength  to  the  soul  through  its  peace,  as,  in  the  23rd  Psalm, 
the  stillness  of  waters. 


IDOLATRY. 


309 


it  to  me  to  decide,  after  bearing  what  they  had  to  say,  with 
which  of  them  I  would  go  ;  and  first  the  hard  featured  and 
masculine  one  spoke  : — 

3G.  "  '  Dear  child,  I  am  the  Art  of  Image-sculpture,  which 
yesterday  you  began  to  learn  ;  and  I  am  as  one  of  your  own 
people,  and  of  your  house,  for  your  grandfather,  (and  she 
named  my  mothers  father)  £  was  a  stone-cutter  ;  and  both 
your  uncles  had  good  name  through  me  :  and  if  you  will  keep 
yourself  well  clear  of  the  sillinesses  and  fluent  follies  that  come 
from  this  creature/  (and  she  pointed  to  the  other  woman)  '  and 
will  follow  me,  and  live  with  me,  first  of  all,  you  shall  be 
brought  up  as  a  man  should  be,  and  have  strong  shoulders  ; 
and,  besides  that,  you  shall  be  kept  well  quit  of  all  restless 
desires,  and  you  shall  never  be  obliged  to  go  away  into  any 
foreign  places,  leaving  your  own  country  and  the  people  of 
your  house  ;  neither  shall  all  men  praise  you  for  your  talk* 
And  you  must  not  despise  this  rude  serviceableness  of  my 
body,  neither  this  meanness  of  my  dusty  dress  ;  for,  pushing 
on  in  their  strength  from  such  things  as  these,  that  great 
Phidias  revealed  Zeus,  and  Polyclitus  wrought  out  Hera,  and 
Myron  was  praised,  and  Praxiteles  marvelled  at :  therefore 
are  these  men  worshipped  with  the  gods.'" 

37.  There  is  a  beautiful  ambiguity  in  the  use  of  the  prep- 
osition wTith  the  genitive  in  this  last  sentence.  "  Pushing  on 
from  these  things "  means  indeed,  justly,  that  the  sculptors 
rose  from  a  mean  state  to  a  noble  one  ;  but  not  as  leaving  the 
mean  state  ; — not  as,  from  a  hard  life,  attaining  to  a  soft  one, 
— but  as  being  helped  and  strengthened  by  the  rough  life  to 
do  what  was  greatest.  Again,  " worshipped  with  the  gods" 
does  not  mean  that  they  are  thought  of  as  in  any  sense  equal 
to,  or  like  to,  the  gods,  but  as  being  on  the  side  of  the  gods 
against  what  is  base  and  ungodly  ;  and  that  the  kind  of  worth 
which  is  in  them  is  therefore  indeed  worshipful,  as  having  its 
source  with  the  gods.  Finally,  observe  that  every  one  of  the 
expressions,  used  of  the  four  sculptors,  is  definitely  the  best 

*  I  have  italicised  this  final  promise  of  blessedness,  given  by  the 
noble  Spirit  of  Workmanship.  Compare  Carlyle  s  5th  Latter-day 
pamphlet,  throughout  ;  but  especially  pp.  12-14,  in  the  first  edition. 


310 


All  AT R  A  PENTELICL 


that  Lucian  could  have  chosen.  Phidias  carved  like  one  who 
had  seen  Zeus,  and  had  only  to  reveal  him  ;  Polyclitus,  in 
labour  of  intellect,  completed  his  sculpture  by  just  law,  and 
ivrought  out  Hera  ;  Myron  was  of  all  most  praised,  because  he 
did  best  what  pleased  the  vulgar  ;  and  Praxiteles,  the  most 
wondered  at  or  admired,  because  he  bestowed  utmost  exqui- 
siteness  of  beauty. 

38.  I  am  sorry  not  to  go  on  with  the  dream  ;  the  more  re- 
fined lady,  as  you  may  remember,  is  liberal  or  gentlemanly 
Education,  and  prevails  at  last ;  so  that  Lucian  becomes  an 
author  instead  of  a  sculptor,  I  think  to  his  own  regret,  though 
to  our  present  benefit.  One  more  passage  of  his  I  must  refer 
you  to,  as  illustrative  of  the  point  before  us  ;  the  description 
of  the  temple  of  the  Syrian  Hieropolis,  where  he  explains  the 
absence  of  the  images  of  the  sun  and  moon.  "  In  the  temple 
itself,"  he  says,  "  on  the  left  hand  as  one  goes  in,  there  is  set 
first  the  throne  of  the  sun  ;  but  no  form  of  him  is  thereon,  for 
of  these  two  powers  alone,  the  sun  and  the  moon,  they  show 
no  carved  images.  And  I  also  learned  why  this  is  their  law, 
for  they  say  that  it  is  permissible,  indeed,  to  make  of  the 
other  gods,  graven  images,  since  the  forms  of  them  are  not 
visible  to  all  men.  But  Helios  and  Selenaia  are  everywhere 
clear  bright,  and  all  men  behold  them  ;  what  need  is  there 
therefore  for  sculptured  work  of  these,  who  appear  in  the 
air  ?  " 

39.  This,  then,  is  the  second  instinct  necessary  to  sculpt- 
ure ;  the  desire  for  the  manifestation,  description,  and  com- 
panionship of  unknown  powers  ;  and  for  possession  of  a  bodily 
substance — the  " bronze  Strasbourg,"  which  you  can  embrace, 
and  hang  immortelles  on  the  head  of — instead  of  an  abstract 
idea.  But  if  you  get  nothing  more  in  the  depth  of  the 
national  mind  than  these  two  feelings,  the  mimetic  and  idol- 
izing instincts,  there  may  be  still  no  progress  possible  for  the 
arts  except  in  delicacy  of  manipulation  and  accumulative 
caprice  of  design.  You  must  have  not  only  the  idolizing  in- 
stinct, but  an  r,6os  which  chooses  the  right  thing  to  idolize ! 
Else,  you  will  get  states  of  art  like  those  in  China  or  India, 
non-progressive,  and  in  great  part  diseased  and  frightful, 


IDOLATRY, 


being  wrought  under  the  influence  of  foolish  terror,  or  foolish 
admiration.  So  that  a  third  condition,  completing  and  con- 
firming both  the  others,  must  exist  in  order  to  the  develop- 
ment of  the  creative  power. 

40.  This  third  condition  is  that  the  heart  of  the  nation 
shall  be  set  on  the  discovery  of  just  or  equal  law,  and  shall  be 
from  day  to  day  developing  that  law  more  perfectly.  The 
Greek  school  of  sculpture  is  formed  during,  and  in  conse- 
quence of,  the  national  effort  to  discover  the  nature  of  justice  ; 
the  Tuscan,  during,  and  in  consequence  of,  the  national  effort 
to  discover  the  nature  of  justification.  I  assert  to  you  at 
present  briefly,  what  will,  I  hope,  be  the  subject  of  prolonged 
illustration  hereafter. 

41.  Now  when  a  nation  with  mimetic  instinct  and  imagina- 
tive longing  is  also  thus  occupied  earnestly  in  the  discovery 
of  Ethic  law,  that  effort  gradually  brings  precision  and  truth 
into  all  its  manual  acts  ;  and  the  physical  progress  of  sculpt- 
ure as  in  the  Greek,  so  in  the  Tuscan,  school,  consists  in 
gradually  limiting  what  was  before  indefinite,  in  verifying 
what  was  inaccurate,  and  in  humanizing  what  was  monstrous. 
I  might  perhaps  content  you  by  showing  these  external  phe- 
nomena, and  by  dwelling  simply  on  the  increasing  desire  of 
naturalness,  which  compels,  in  every  successive  decade  -of 
years,  literally,  in  the  sculptured  images,  the  mimicked  bones 
to  come  together,  bone  to  his  bone  ;  and  the  flesh  to  come 
up  upon  them,  until  from  a  flattened  and  pinched  handful  of 
clay,  respecting  which  you  may  gravely  question  whether  it 
was  intended  for  a  human  form  at  all ; — by  slow  degrees,  and 
added  touch  to  touch,  in  increasing  consciousness  of  the 
bodily  truth, — at  last  the  Aphrodite  of  Melos  stands  before 
you,  a  perfect  woman.  But  all  that  search  for  physical  accu- 
racy is  merely  the  external  operation,  in  the  arts,  of  the  seek- 
ing for  truth  in  the  inner  soul  ;  it  is  impossible  without  that 
higher  effort,  and  the  demonstration  of  it  would  be  worse 
than  useless  to  you,  unless  I  made  you  aware  at  the  same  time 
of  its  spiritual  cause. 

42.  Observe  farther  ;  the  increasing  truth  in  representation 
is  co-relative  with  increasing  beauty  in  the  thing  to  be  repre- 


312 


ABATE  A  PENTELICL 


sented.  The  pursuit  of  justice  which  regulates  the  imitative 
effort,  regulates  also  the  development  of  the  race  into  dignity 
of  person,  as  of  mind  ;  and  their  culminating  art-skill  attains 
the  grasp  of  entire  truth  at  the  moment  when  the  truth  be- 
comes most  lovely.  And  then,  ideal  sculpture  may  go  on 
safely  into  portraiture.  But  I  shall  not  touch  on  the  subject 
of  portrait  sculpture  to-day ;  it  introduces  many  questions  of 
detail,  and  must  be  a  matter  for  subsequent  consideration. 

43.  These  then  are  the  three  great  passions  which  are  con- 
cerned in  true  sculpture.  I  cannot  find  better,  or,  at  least, 
more  easily  remembered,  names  for  them  than  "  the  Instincts 
of  Mimicry,  Idolatry,  and  Discipline  ; 99  meaning,  by  the  last, 
the  desire  of  equity  and  wholesome  restraint,  in  all  acts  and 
works  of  life.  Now  of  these,  there  is  no  question  but  that  the 
love  of  Mimicry  is  natural  and  right,  and  the  love  of  Disci- 
pline is  natural  and  right.  But  it  looks  a  grave  question 
whether  the  yearning  for  Idolatry,  (the  desire  of  companion-? 
ship  with  images,)  is  right.  Whether,  indeed,  if  such  an  in- 
stinct be  essential  to  good  sculpture,  the  art  founded  on  it  can 
possibly  be  "fine"  art. 

44.  I  must  now  beg  for  your  close  attention,  because  I  have 
to  point  out  distinctions  in  modes  of  conception  which  will 
appear  trivial  to  you,  unless  accurately  understood  ;  but  of 
an  importance  in  the  history  of  art  which  cannot  be  over- 
rated. 

When  the  populace  of  Paris  adorned  the  statue  of  Stras- 
bourg with  immortelles,  none,  even  the  simplest  of  the  pious 
decorators,  would  suppose  that  the  city  of  Strasbourg  itself, 
or  any  spirit  or  ghost  of  the  city,  was  actually  there,  sitting  in 
the  Place  de  la  Concorde.  The  figure  was  delightful  to  them 
as  a  visible  nucleus  for  their  fond  thoughts  about  Strasbourg  ; 
but  never  for  a  moment  supposed  to  be  Strasbourg. 

Similarly,  they  might  have  taken  delight  in  a  statue  pur- 
porting to  represent  a  river  instead  of  a  city, — the  Rhine,  or 
Garonne,  suppose, — and  have  been  touched  with  strong 
emotion  in  looking  at  it,  if  the  real  river  were  dear  to  thern, 
and  yet  never  think  for  an  instant  that  the  statue  ivas  the 
river. 


IDOLATRY. 


313 


And  yet  again,  similarly,  but  much  more  distinctly,  they 
might  take  delight  in  the  beautiful  image  of  a  god,  because  if: 
gathered  and  perpetuated  their  thoughts  about  that  god  ; 
and  yet  never  suppose,  nor  be  capable  of  being  deceived  by 
any  arguments  into  supposing,  that  the  statue  was  the  god. 

On  the  other  hand,  if  a  meteoric  stone  fell  from  the  sky  in 
the  sight  of  a  savage,  and  he  picked  it  up  hot,  he  would  most 
piobably  lay  it  aside  in  some,  to  him,  sacred  place,  and  be- 
lieve the  stone  itself  to  be  a  kind  of  god,  and  offer  prayer  and 
sacrifice  to  it. 

In  like  manner,  any  other  strange  or  terrifying  object, 
st^h,  for  instance,  as  a  powerfully  noxious  animal  or  plant, 
he  would  be  apt  to  regard  in  the  same  way  ;  and  very  pos- 
sibly also  construct  for  himself  frightful  idols  of  some  kind, 
calculated  to  produce  upon  him  a  vague  impression  of  their 
being  alive ;  whose  imaginary  anger  he  might  deprecate  or 
avert  with  sacrifice,  although  incapable  of  conceiving  in  them 
any  one  attribute  of  exalted  intellectual  or  moral  nature. 

45.  If  you  will  now  refer  to  §  52-59  of  my  Introductory 
Lectures,  you  will  find  this  distinction  between  a  resolute 
conception,  recognized  for  such,  and  an  involuntary  appre- 
hension of  spiritual  existence,  already  insisted  on  at  some 
length.  And  you  will  see  more  and  more  clearly  as  we  pro- 
ceed, that  the  deliberate  and  intellectually  commanded  con- 
ception is  not  idolatrous  in  any  evil  sense  whatever,  but  is  one 
of  the  grandest  and  wholesomest  functions  of  the  human  soul ; 
and  that  the  essence  of  evil  idolatry  begins  only  in  the  idea 
or  belief  of  a  real  presence  of  any  kind,  in  a  thing  in  which 
there  is  no  such  presence. 

46.  I  need  not  say  that  the  harm  of  the  idolatry  must  de- 
pend on  the  certainty  of  the  negative.  If  there  be  a  real 
presence  in  a  pillar  of  cloud,  in  an  unconsuming  flame,  or  in 
a  still  small  voice,  it  is  no  sin  to  bow  down  before  these. 

But,  as  matter  of  historical  fact,  the  idea  of  such  presence 
has  generally  been  both  ignoble  and  false,  and  confined  to 
nations  of  inferior  race,  who  are  often  condemned  to  remain 
for  ages  in  conditions  of  vile  terror,  destitute  of  thought. 
Nearly  all  Indian  architecture  and  Chinese  design  arise  out 

I 


314 


ABATE  A  PENTELICI. 


of  such  a  state  :  so  also,  though  in  a  less  gross  degree,  Nin- 
evite  and  Phoenician  art,  early  Irish,  and  Scandinavian  ;  th<i 
latter,  however,  with  vital  elements  of  high  intellect  mingled 
in  it  from  the  first. 

But  the  greatest  races  are  never  grossly  subject  to  such 
terror,  even  in  their  childhood,  and  the  course  of  their  minds 
is  broadly  divisible  into  three  distinct  stages. 

47.  (I.)  In  their  infancy  they  begin  to  imitate  the  real 
animals  about  them,  as  my  little  girl  made  the  cats  and  mice, 
but  with  an  undercurrent  of  partial  superstition — a  sense  that 
there  must  be  more  in  the  creatures  than  they  can  see  ;  also 
they  catch  up  vividly  any  of  the  fancies  of  the  baser  nations 
round  them,  and  repeat  these  more  or  less  apishly,  yet  rapidly 
naturalizing  and  beautifying  them.  They  then  connect  all 
kinds  of  shapes  together,  compounding  meanings  out  of  the 
old  chimeras,  and  inventing  new  ones  with  the  speed  of  a 
running  wild-fire  ;  but  always  getting  more  of  man  into  their 
images,  and  admitting  less  of  monster  or  brute  ;  their  own 
characters,  meanwhile,  expanding  and  purging  themselves, 
and  shaking  off  the  feverish  fancy,  as  springing  flowei'3 
shake  the  earth  off  their  stalks. 

48.  (II.)  In  the  second  stage,  being  now  themselves  perfect 
men  and  women,  they  reach  the  conception  of  true  and  great 
gods  as  existent  in  the  universe;  and  absolutely  cease  to 
think  of  them  as  in  any  wise  present  in  statues  or  images ; 
but  they  have  now  learned  to  make  these  statues  beautifully 
human,  and  to  surround  them  with  attributes  that  may  con- 
centrate their  thoughts  of  the  gods.  This  is,  in  Greece,  ac- 
curately the  Pindaric  time,  just  a  little  preceding  the  Phidian  ; 
the  Phidian  is  already  dimmed  with  a  faint  shadow  of  infidel- 
ity ;  still,  the  Olympic  Zeus  may  be  taken  as  a  sufficiently 
central  type  of  a  statue  which  was  no  more  supposed  to  be 
Zeus,  than  the  gold  or  elephants'  tusks  it  was  made  of  ;  but 
in  which  the  most  splendid  powers  of  human  art  were  ex- 
hausted in  representing  a  believed  and  honoured  God  to  the 
happy  and  holy  imagination  of  a  sincerely  religious  people. 

49.  (III.)  The  third  stage  of  national  existence  follows,  in 
which,  the  imagination  having  now  done  its  utmost,  and  be 


IDOLATRY, 


315 


ing  partly  restrained  by  the  sanctities  of  tradition,  which 
permit  no  farther  change  in  the  conceptions  previously 
created,  begins  to  be  superseded  by  logical  deduction  and 
scientific  investigation.  At  the  same  moment,  the  elder  ar- 
tists having  done  all  that  is  possible  in  realizing  the  national 
conceptions  of  the  Gods,  the  younger  ones,  forbidden  to 
change  the  scheme  of  existing  representations,  and  incapable 
of  doing  anything  better  in  that  kind,  betake  themselves  to 
refine  and  decorate  the  old  ideas  with  more  attractive  skill. 
Their  aims  are  thus  more  and  more  limited  to  manual  dexter- 
ity, and  their  fancy  paralyzed.  Also,  in  the  course  of  centu- 
ries, the  methods  of  every  art  continually  improving,  and  be- 
ing made  subjects  of  popular  inquiry,  praise  is  now  to  be  got, 
for  eminence  in  these,  from  the  whole  mob  of  the  nation  ; 
whereas  intellectual  design  can  never  be  discerned  but  by  the 
few.  So  that  in  this  third  nera  we  find  every  kind  of  imitative 
and  vulgar  dexterity  more  and  more  cultivated  ;  while  design 
and  imagination  are  every  day  less  cared  for,  and  less  possible. 

50.  Meanwhile,  as  I  have  just  said,  the  leading  minds  in 
literature  and  science  become  continually  more  logical  and 
investigative  ;  and,  once  that  they  are  established  in  the 
habit  of  testing  facts  accurately,  a  very  few  years  are  enough 
to  convince  all  the  strongest  thinkers  that  the  old  imaginative 
religion  is  untenable,  and  cannot  any  longer  be  honestly 
taught  in  its  fixed  traditional  form,  except  by  ignorant  per- 
sons. And  at  this  point  the  fate  of  the  people  absolutely  de- 
pends on  the  degree  of  moral  strength  into  which  their  hearts 
have  been  already  trained.  If  it  be  a  strong,  industrious, 
chaste,  and  honest  race,  the  taking  its  old  gods,  or  at  least 
the  old  forms  of  them,  away  from  it,  wTill  indeed  make  it 
deeply  sorrowful  and  amazed  ;  but  will  in  no  whit  shake  its 
will,  nor  alter  its  practice.  Exceptional  persons,  naturally 
disposed  to  become  drunkards,  harlots,  and  cheats,  but  who 
had  been  previously  restrained  from  indulging  these  disposi- 
tions by  their  fear  of  God,  will,  of  course,  break  out  into  open 
vice,  when  that  fear  is  removed.  But  the  heads  of  the  fami- 
lies of  the  people,  instructed  in  the  pure  habits  and  perfect 
delights  of  an  honest  life,  and  to  whom  the  thought  of  a 


316 


ABA  TEA  PENT E LIC L 


Father  in  heaven  had  been  a  comfort,  not  a  restraint,  will 
assuredly  not  seek  relief  from  the  discomfort  of  their  orphan- 
age by  becoming  uncharitable  and  vile.  Also  the  high  leaders 
of  their  thought  gather  their  whole  strength  together  in  the 
gloom  ;  and  at  the  first  entrance  of  this  valley  of  the  Shadow 
of  Death,  look  their  new  enemy  full  in  the  eyeless  face  of  him, 
and  subdue  him,  and  his  terror,  under  their  feet.  "  Metus 
omnes,  et  inexorabile  fatum,  .  .  .  strepitumque  Acherontis 
atari.';  This  is  the  condition  of  national  soul  expressed  by 
the  art,  and  the  words,  of  Holbein,  Durer,  Shakspeare,  PojDe, 
and  Goethe. 

51.  But  if  the  people,  at  the  moment  when  the  trial  of 
darkness  approaches,  be  not  confirmed  in  moral  character, 
but  are  only  maintaining  a  superficial  virtue  by  the  aid  of 
a  spectral  religion  ;  the  moment  the  staff  of  their  faith  is 
broken,  the  character  of  the  race  falls  like  a  climbing  plant 
cut  from  its  hold  :  then  all  the  earthliest  vices  attack  it  as  it 
lies  in  the  dust;  every  form  of  sensual  and  insane  sin  is 
developed,  and  half  a  century  is  sometimes  enough  to  close, 
in  hopeless  shame,  the  career  of  the  nation  in  literature,  art, 
and  war. 

52.  Notably,  within  the  last  hundred  years,  all  religion  has 
perished  from  the  practically  active  national  mind  of  France 
and  England.  No  statesman  in  the  senate  of  either  country 
would  dare  to  use  a  sentence  out  of  their  acceptedly  divine 
Eevelation,  as  having  now  a  literal  authority  over  them  for 
their  guidance,  or  even  a  suggestive  wisdom  for  their  con- 
templation. England,  especially,  has  cast  her  Bible  full  in 
the  face  of  her  former  God  ;  and  proclaimed,  with  open 
challenge  to  Him,  her  resolved  worship  of  His  declared 
enemy,  Mammon.  All  the  arts,  therefore,  founded  on  relig- 
ion, and  sculpture  chiefly,  are  here  in  England  effete  and 
corrupt,  to  a  degree  which  arts  never  were  hitherto  in  the 
history  of  mankind  :  and  it  is  possible  to  show  you  the  con- 
dition of  sculpture  living,  and  sculpture  dead,  in  accurate  op- 
position, by  simply  comparing  the  nascent  Pisan  school  in  Italy 
with  the  existing  school  in  England. 

53.  You  were  perhaps  surprised  at  my  placing  in  your 


IDOLATRY. 


educational  series,  as  a  type  of  original  Italian  sculpture,  the 
pulpit  by  Niccola  Pisano  in  the  Duomo  of  Siena.  I  would 
rather,  had  it  been  possible,  have  given  the  pulpit  by  Giovanni 
Pisano  in  the  Duomo  of  Pisa  ;  but  that  pulpit  is  dispersed  in 
fragments  through  the  upper  galleries  of  the  Duomo,  and  the 
cloister  of  the  Campo  Santo  ;  and  the  casts  of  its  fragments 
now  put  together  at  Kensington  are  too  coarse  to  be  of  use  to 
you.  You  may  partly  judge,  however,  of  the  method  of  their 
execution  by  the  eagle's  head,  which  I  have  sketched  from  the 
marble  in  the  Campo  Santo  (Edu.,  No.  113),  and  the  lioness 
with  her  cubs,  (Edu.,  No.  103,  more  carefully  studied  at 
Siena)  ;  and  I  will  get  you  other  illustrations  in  due  time. 
Meanwhile,  I  want  you  to  compare  the  main  purpose  of  the 
Cathedral  of  Pisa,  and  its  associated  Bell  Tower,  Baptistery, 
and  Holy  Field,  with  the  main  purpose  of  the  principal  build- 
ing lately  raised  for  the  people  of  London.  In  these  days,  we 
indeed  desire  no  cathedrals ;  but  we  have  constructed  an 
enormous  and  costly  edifice,  which,  in  claiming  educational 
influence  over  the  whole  London  populace,  and  middle  class, 
is  verily  the  Metropolitan  cathedral  of  this  century, — the 
Crystal  Palace. 

54.  It  was  proclaimed,  at  its  erection,  an  example  of  a  newly 
discovered  style  of  architecture,  greater  than  any  hitherto 
known, — our  best  popular  writers,  in  their  enthusiasm,  de- 
scribing it  as  an  edifice  of  Fairyland.  You  are  nevertheless  to 
observe  that  this  novel  production  of  fairy  enchantment  is 
destitute  of  every  kind  of  sculpture,  except  the  bosses  pro- 
duced by  the  heads  of  nails  and  rivets ;  while  the  Duomo  of 
Pisa,  in  the  wreathen  work  of  its  doors,  in  the  foliage  of  its 
capitals,  inlaid  colour  designs  of  its  fa£ade,  embossed  panels 
of  its  baptistery  font,  and  figure  sculpture  of  its  two  pulpits, 
contained  the  germ  of  a  school  of  sculpture  which  was  to 
maintain,  through  a  subsequent  period  of  four  hundred  years, 
the  greatest  power  yet  reached  by  the  arts  of  the  world  in 
description  of  Form,  and  expression  of  Thought. 

55.  Now  it  is  easy  to  show  you  the  essential  cause  of  the 
vast  discrepancy  in  the  character  of  these  two  buildings. 

In  the  vault  of  the  apse  of  the  Duomo  of  Pisa,  was  a 


ABATE  A  PENTELICL 


colossal  image  of  Christ,  in  coloured  mosaic,  bearing  to  tha 
temple,  as  nearly  as  possible,  the  relation  which  the  statue  of 
Athena  bore  to  the  Parthenon  ;  and  in  the  same  manner,  con- 
centrating the  imagination  of  the  Pisan  on  the  attributes  of  the 
God  in  whom  he  believed. 

In  precisely  the  same  position  with  respect  to  the  nave  of 
the  building,  but  of  larger  size,  as  proportioned  to  the  three 
or  four  times  greater  scale  of  the  whole,  a  colossal  piece  of 
sculpture  was  placed  by  English  designers,  at  the  extremity 
of  the  Crystal  Palace,  in  preparation  for  their  solemnities  in 
honour  of  the  birthday  of  Christ,  in  December,  1867  or  1868. 

That  piece  of  sculpture  was  the  face  of  the  clown  in  a 
pantomime,  some  twelve  feet  high  from  brow  to  chin,  which 
face,  being  moved  by  the  mechanism  which  is  our  pride,  every 
half  minute  opened  its  mouth  from  ear  to  ear,  showed  its 
teeth,  and  revolved  its  eyes,  the  force  of  these  periodical 
seasons  of  expression  being  increased  and  explained  by  the 
illuminated  inscription  underneath  "Here  we  are  again. " 

56.  When  it  is  assumed,  and  with  too  good  reason,  that 
the  mind  of  the  English  populace  is  to  be  addressed,  in  the 
principal  Sacred  Festival  of  its  year,  by  sculpture  such  as  this, 
I  need  scarcely  point  out  to  you  that  the  hope  is  absolutely 
futile  of  advancing  their  intelligence  by  collecting  within  this 
building,  (itself  devoid  absolutely  of  every  kind  of  art,  and  so 
vilely  constructed  that  those  who  traverse  it  are  continually  in 
danger  of  falling  over  the  cross-bars  that  bind  it  together) 
examples  of  sculpture  filched  indiscriminately  from  the  past 
work,  bad  and  good,  of  Turks,  Greeks,  Romans,  Moors,  and 
Christians,  miscoloured,  misplaced,  and  misinterpreted  ;  * 
here  thrust  into  unseemly  corners,  and  there  mortised  together 
into  mere  confusion  of  heterogeneous  obstacle  ;  pronouncing 
itself  hourly  more  intolerable  in  weariness,  until  any  kind  of 
relief  is  sought  from  it  in  steam  wheelbarrows  or  cheap  toy- 

*  /k  Falsely  represented,"  would  be  the  better  expression.  In  the  cast 
of  the  tomb  of  Queen  Eleanor,  for  a  single  instance,  the  Gothic  foliage 
of  which  one  essential  virtue  is  its  change  over  every  shield,  is  repre- 
sented by  a  repetition  of  casts  from  one  mould,  of  which  the  design  it- 
self is  entirely  conjectural. 


IDOLATRY. 


319 


shops  ;  and  most  of  all  in  beer  and  meat,  the  corks  and  the 
bones  being  dropped  through  the  chinks  in  the  damp  deal 
flooring  of  the  English  Fairy  Palace. 

57.  But  you  will  probably  think  me  unjust  in  assuming 
that  a  building  prepared  only  for  the  amusement  of  the  peo- 
ple can  typically  represent  the  architecture  or  sculpture  of 
modern  England.  You  may  urge,  that  I  ought  rather  to  de- 
scribe the  qualities  of  the  refined  sculpture  which  is  executed 
in  large  quantities  for  private  persons  belonging  to  the  upper 
classes,  and  for  sepulchral  and  memorial  purposes.  But  I 
could  not  now  criticise  that  sculpture  with  any  power  of  con- 
viction to  you,  because  I  have  not  yet  stated  to  you  the  prin- 
ciples of  good  sculpture  in  general.  I  will,  however,  in  some 
points,  tell  you  the  facts  by  anticipation. 

58.  We  have  much  excellent  portrait  sculpture  ;  but  portrait 
sculpture,  which  is  nothing  more,  is  always  third-rate  work, 
even  when  produced  by  men  of  genius  ; — nor  does  it  in  the 
least  require  men  of  genius  to  produce  it.  To  paint  a  por- 
trait, indeed,  implies  the  very  highest  gifts  of  painting  ;  but 
any  man,  of  ordinary  patience  and  artistic  feeling,  can  carve  a 
satisfactory  bust. 

59.  Of  our  powers  in  historical  sculpture,  I  am,  without 
question,  just,  in  taking  for  sufficient  evidence  the  monuments 
we  have  erected  to  our  two  greatest  heroes  by  sea  and  land  ; 
namely,  the  Nelson  Column,  and  the  statue  of  the  Duke  of 
"Wellington  opposite  Apsley  House.  Nor  will  you,  I  hope, 
think  me  severe, — certainly,  whatever  you  may  think  me,  I 
am  using  only  the  most  temperate  language,  in  saying  of  both 
these  monuments,  that  they  are  absolutely  devoid  of  high 
sculptural  merit.  But,  consider  how  much  is  involved  in  the 
fact  thus  dispassionately  stated,  respecting  the  two  monu- 
ments in  the  principal  places  of  our  capital,  to  our  two  great- 
est heroes. 

60.  Kemember  that  we  have  before  our  e}Tes,  as  subjects  of 
perpetual  study  and  thought,  the  art  of  all  the  world  for  three 
thousand  years  past  :  especially,  we  have  the  best  sculpture 
of  Greece,  for  example  of  bodily  perfection  ;  the  best  of  Rome, 
for  example  of  character  in  portraiture  ;  the  best  of  Florence, 


320 


ABA  TEA  PENTELICI. 


for  example  of  romantic  passion  :  we  have  unlimited  access 
to  books  and  other  sources  of  instruction  ;  we  have  the  most; 
perfect  scientific  illustrations  of  anatomy,  both  human  and 
comparative  ;  and,  we  have  bribes  for  the  reward  of  success, 
large,  in  the  proportion  of  at  least  twenty  to  one,  as  compared 
with  those  offered  to  the  artists  of  any  other  period.  And 
with  all  these  advantages,  and  the  stimulus  also  of  fame  car- 
ried instantly  by  the  press  to  the  remotest  corners  of  Europe, 
the  best  efforts  we  can  make,  on  the  grandest  of  occasions,  re- 
sult in  work  which  it  is  impossible  in  any  one  particular  to 
praise. 

Now  consider  for  yourselves  what  an  intensity  of  the  nega- 
tion of  the  faculty  of  sculpture  this  implies  in  the  national 
mind  !  What  measures  can  be  assigned  to  the  gulf  of  inca- 
pacit}r,  which  can  deliberately  swallow  up  in  the  gorge  of  it 
the  teaching  and  example  of  three  thousand  years,  and  pro- 
duce as  the  result  of  that  instruction,  what  it  is  courteous  to 
call  " nothing?" 

61.  That  is  the  conclusion  at  which  we  arrive,  on  the  evi- 
dence presented  by  our  historical  sculpture.  To  complete  the 
measure  of  ourselves,  we  must  endeavour  to  estimate  the  rank 
of  the  two  opposite  schools  of  sculpture  employed  by  us  in 
the  nominal  service  of  religion,  and  in  the  actual  service  of 
vice, 

I  am  aware  of  no  statue  of  Christ,  nor  of  any  apostle  of 
Christ,  nor  of  any  scene  related  in  the  New  Testament,  pro- 
duced by  us  within  the  last  three  hundred  years,  which  has 
possessed  even  superficial  merit  enough  to  attract  public  at- 
tention. 

Whereas  the  steadily  immoral  effect  of  the  formative  art 
which  we  learn,  more  or  less  apishly,  from  the  French  schools, 
and  employ,  but  too  gladly,  in  manufacturing  articles  for  the 
amusement  of  the  luxurious  classes,  must  be  ranked  as  one 
of  the  chief  instruments  used  by  joyful  fiends  and  angry  fates, 
for  the  ruin  of  our  civilization. 

If,  after  I  have  set  before  you  the  nature  and  principles  of 
true  sculpture,  in  Athens,  Pisa,  and  Florence,  you  reconsider 
these  facts, — (which  you  will  then  at  once  recognize  as  such). 


IDOLATRY. 


321 


— you  will  find  that  they  absolutely  justify  my  assertion  that 
the  state  of  sculpture  in  modern  England,  as  compared  with 
that  of  the  great  Ancients,  is  literally  one  of  corrupt  and  dis- 
honourable death,  as  opposed  to  bright  and  fameful  life. 

62.  And  now,  will  you  bear  with  me,  while  I  tell  you  finally 
why  this  is  so  ? 

The  cause  with  which  you  are  personally  concerned  is  your 
own  frivolity  ;  though  essentially  this  is  not  your  fault,  but 
that  of  the  system  of  your  early  training.  But  the  fact,  re- 
mains the  same,  that  here,  in  Oxford,  you,  a  chosen  body  of 
English  youth,  in  no  wise  care  for  the  history  of  your  coun- 
try, for  its  present  dangers,  or  its  present  duties.  You  still, 
like  children  of  seven  or  eight  years  old,  are  interested  only  in 
bats,  balls,  and  oars  :  nay,  including  with  you  the  students  of 
Germany  and  France,  it  is  certain  that  the  general  body  of 
modern  European  youth  have  their  minds  occupied  more  seri- 
ously by  the  sculpture  and  painting  of  the  bowls  of  their 
tobacco-pipes,  than  by  all  the  divinest  workmanship  and  pas- 
sionate imagination  of  Greece,  Rome,  and  Mediaeval  Chris- 
tendom. 

63.  But  the  elementary  causes,  both  of  this  frivolity  in  you, 
and  of  worse  than  frivolity  in  older  persons,  are  the  two  forms 
of  deadly  Idolatry  which  are  now  all  but  universal  in  Eng- 
land. 

The  first  of  these  is  the  worship  of  the  Eidolon,  or  Phan- 
tasm of  Wealth  ;  worship  of  which  you  will  find  the  nature 
partly  examined  in  the  37th  paragraph  of  my  Manera  Pul- 
veris  ;  but  which  is  briefly  to  be  defined  as  the  servile  appre- 
hension of  an  active  power  in  Money,  and  the  submission  to 
it  as  the  God  of  our  life. 

64.  The  second  elementary  cause  of  the  loss  of  our  nobly 
imaginative  faculty,  is  the  worship  of  the  Letter,  instead  of  the 
Spirit,  in  what  we  chiefly  accept  as  the  ordinance  and  teach- 
ing of  Deity  ;  and  the  apprehension  of  a  healing  sacredness  in 
the  act  of  reading  the  Book  whose  primal  commands  we  re- 
fuse to  obey. 

No  feather  idol  of  Polynesia  was  ever  a  sign  of  a  more 
shameful  idolatry,  than  the  modern  notion  in  the  minds  of 


ARATRA  PENT  ELI  CI. 


certainly  the  majority  of  English  religious  persons,  that  the 
Word  of  God,  by  which  the  heavens  were  of  old,  and  the 
earth,  standing  out  of  the  water  and  in  the  water, — the  Word 
of  God  which  came  to  the  prophets,  and  comes  still  for  ever  to 
all  who  will  hear  it,  (and  to  many  who  will  forbear)  ;  and 
which,  called  Faithful  and  True,  is  to  lead  forth,  in  the  judg- 
ment, the  armies  of  heaven, — that  this  "  Word  of  God  "  may 
yet  be  bound  at  our  pleasure  in  morocco,  and  carried  about 
in  a  young  lady's  pocket,  with  tasselled  ribands  to  mark  the 
passages  she  most  approves  of. 

65.  Gentlemen,  there  has  hitherto  been  seen  no  instance, 
and  England  is  little  likely  to  give  the  unexampled  spectacle, 
of  a  country  successful  in  the  noble  arts,  yet  in  which  the 
youths  were  frivolous,  the  maidens  falsely  religious,  the  men, 
slaves  of  money,  and  the  matrons,  of  vanity.  Not  from  all  the 
marble  of  the  hills  of  Luni  will  such  a  people  ever  shape  one 
statue  that  may  stand  nobly  against  the  sky ;  not  from  all 
the  treasures  bequeathed  to  them  by  the  great  dead,  will  they 
gather,  for  their  own  descendants,  any  inheritance  but  shame. 


LECTURE  in. 

IMAGINATION. 

November,  1870. 

66.  The  principal  object  of  the  preceding  lecture  (and  I 
choose  rather  to  incur  your  blame  for  tediousness  in  repeat- 
ing, than  for  obscurity  in  defining  it),  was  to  enforce  the  dis- 
tinction between  the  ignoble  and  false  phase  of  Idolatry,  which 
consists  in  the  attribution  of  a  spiritual  power  to  a  material 
thing  ;  and  the  noble  and  truth-seeking  phase  of  it,  to  which 
I  shall  in  these  lectures  *  give  the  general  term  of  Imagina- 

*  I  shall  be  obliged  in  future  lectures,  as  hitherto  in  my  other  writ- 
ings, to  use  the  terms,  Idolatry  and  Imagination  in  a  more  comprehen- 
sive sense;  but  here  I  use  them  for  convenience  sake,  limitedly,  to 
avoid  the  continual  occurrence  of  the  terms,  noble  and  ignoble,  or  false 
and  true,  with  reference  to  modes  of  conception. 


IMAGINATION. 


823 


Fig.  2. 


IMAGINATION. 


325 


tion  ; — that  is  to  say,  the  invention  of  material  symbols  which 
may  lead  us  to  contemplate  the  character  and  nature  of  gods, 
spirits,  or  abstract  virtues  and  powers,  without  in  the  least 
implying  the  actual  presence  of  such  Beings  among  us,  or 
even  their  possession,  in  reality,  of  the  forms  we  attribute  to 
them. 

67.  For  instance,  in  the  ordinarily  received  Greek  t}*pe  of 
Athena,  on  vases  of  the  Phidian  time  (sufficiently  represented 
in  the  opposite  woodcut),  no  Greek  would  have  supposed  the 
vase  on  which  this  was  painted  to  be  itself  Athena,  nor  to  con- 
tain Athena  inside  of  it,  as  the  Arabian  fisherman's  casket 
contained  the  genie  ;  neither  did  he  think  that  this  rude 
black  painting,  done  at  speed  as  the  potter's  fancy  urged  his 
hand,  represented  anything  like  the  form  or  aspect  of  the 
Goddess  herself.  Nor  would  he  have  thought  so,  even  had 
the  image  been  ever  so  beautifully  wrought.  The  goddess 
might,  indeed,  visibly  appear  under  the  form  of  an  armed 
virgin,  as  she  might  under  that  of  a  hawk  or  a  swallow,  when 
it  pleased  her  to  give  such  manifestation  of  her  presence  ;  but 
it  did  not,  therefore,  follow  that  she  was  constantly  invested 
with  any  of  these  forms,  or  that  the  best  which  human  skill 
could,  even  by  her  own  aid,  picture  of  her,  was,  indeed,  a 
likeness  of  her.  The  real  use,  at  all  events,  of  this  rude 
image,  was  only  to  signify  to  the  eye  and  heart  the  facts  of 
the  existence,  in  some  manner,  of  a  Spirit  of  wisdom,  perfect 
in  gentleness,  irresistible  in  anger  ;  having  also  physical  do- 
minion over  the  air  which  is  the  life  and  breadth  of  all  creat- 
ures, and  clothed,  to  human  eyes,  with  aegis  of  fiery  cloud,  and 
raiment  of  falling  dew. 

68.  In  the  yet  more  abstract  conception  of  the  Spirit  of 
agriculture,  in  which  the  wings  of  the  chariot  represent  the 
winds  of  spring,  and  its  crested  dragons  are  originally  a  mere 
type  of  the  seed  with  its  twisted  root  piercing  the  ground, 
and  sharp-edged  leaves  rising  above  it ;  we  are  in  still  less 
danger  of  mistaking  the  symbol  for  the  presumed  form  of  an 
actual  Person.  But  I  must,  with  persistence,  beg  of  you  to 
observe  that  in  all  the  noble  actions  of  imagination  in  this 
kind,  the  distinction  from  idolatry  consists,  not  in  the  denial  of 


32G  ABATRA  PENTELIGI. 

the  being,  or  presence  of  the  Spirit,  but  only  in  the  due  recog* 
nition  of  our  human  incapacity  to  conceive  the  one,  or  compel 
the  other. 


Fig.  3. 


69.  Farther — and  for  this  statement  I  claim  your  attention 
still  more  earnestly.  As  no  nation  has  ever  attained  real 
greatness  during  periods  in  which  it  was  subject  to  any  condi- 
tion of  Idolatry,  so  no  nation  has  ever  attained  or  persevered 
in  greatness,  except  in  reaching  and  maintaining  a  passionate 
Imagination  of  a  spiritual  estate  higher  than  that  of  men  ;  and 
of  spiritual  creatures  nobler  than  men,  having  a  quite  real  and 
personal  existence,  however  imperfectly  apprehended  by  us. 


IMAGINATION. 


327 


And  all  the  arts  of  the  present  age  deserving  to  be  included 
under  the  name  of  sculpture  have  been  degraded  by  us,  and 
all  principles  of  just  policy  have  vanished  from  us, — and  that 
totally, — for  this  double  reason  ;  that  we  are  on  one  side,  given 
up  to  idolatries  of  the  most  servile  kind,  as  I  showed  you  in 
the  close  of  the  last  lecture, — while,  on  the  other  hand,  we  have 
absolutely  ceased  from  the  exercise  of  faithful  imagination  ; 
and  the  only  remnants  of  the  desire  of  truth  which  remain  in 
us  have  been  corrupted  into  a  prurient  itch  to  discover  the 
origin  of  life  in  the  nature  of  the  dust,  and  prove  that  the 
source  of  the  order  of  the  universe  is  the  accidental  concurrence 
of  its  atoms. 

70.  Under  these  two  calamities  of  our  time,  the  art  of  sculpt- 
ure has  perished  more  totally  than  any  other,  because  the 
object  of  that  art  is  exclusively  the  representation  of  form  as 
the  exponent  of  life.  It  is  essentially  concerned  only  with  the 
human  form,  which  is  the  exponent  of  the  highest  life  we 
know  ;  and  with  all  subordinate  forms  only  as  they  exhibit 
conditions  of  vital  power  which  have  some  certain  relation  to 
humanity.  It  deals  with  the  "  particula  undique  clesecta  "  of 
the  animal  nature,  and  itself  contemplates,  and  brings  forward 
for  its  disciples'  contemplation,  all  the  energies  of  creation 
which  transform  the  -mqXo^  or  lower  still,  the  /36p/3opos  of  the 
trivia,  by  Athena's  help,  into  forms  of  power  ; — (to  iAv  o\ov 
ap)(LT€KTWV  olvtos  r/v.  (TvvtLpya^zTO  8i  rot  kcll  rj  'Adrjva  ifXTTviovcra 
rbv  7rrj\6v  /cat  e/xi^^a  Troiovcra  elvol  ra  TrXaayxaTa  — but  it  has 
nothing  whatever  to  do  with  the  representation  of  forms  not 
living,  however  beautiful,  (as  of  clouds  or  waves)  ;  nor  may 
it  condescend  to  use  its  perfect  skill,  except  in  expressing  the 
noblest  conditions  of  life. 

These  laws  of  sculpture,  being  wholly  contrary  to  the  prac- 
tice of  our  day,  I  cannot  expect  you  to  accept  on  my  assertion, 
nor  do  I  wish  you  to  do  so,  By  placing  definitely  good  and 
bad  sculpture  before  you,  I  do  not  doubt  but  that  I  shall 

*  M  And  in  sum,  he  himself  (Prometheus)  was  the  master-maker,  and 
A.thena  worked  together  with  him,  breathing  into  the  clay,  and  caused 
the  moulded  things  to  have  soul  (psyche)  in  them." — Lucian,  PromE' 

THEUS. 


328 


ARATRA  PENTELICL 


gradually  prove  to  you  the  nature  of  all  excelling  and  endur- 
ing qualities  ;  but  to-day  I  will  only  confirm  my  assertions  by 
laying  before  you  the  statement  of  the  Greeks  themselves  on 
the  subject ;  given  in  their  own  noblest  time,  and  assuredly 
authoritative,  in  every  point  which  it  embraces,  for  all  time 
to  come. 

71.  If  any  of  you  have  looked  at  the  explanation  I  have 
given  of  the  myth  of  Athena  in  my  Queen  of  the  Air,  you  can- 
not but  have  been  surprised  that  I  took  scarcely  any  note  of 
the  story  of  her  birth.  I  did  not,  because  that  story  is  con- 
nected intimately  with  the  Apolline  myths  ;  and  is  told  of 
Athena,  not  essentially  as  the  goddess  of  the  air,  but  as  the 
goddess  of  Art-Wisdom. 

You  have  probably  often  smiled  at  the  legend  itself,  or 
avoided  thinking  of  it,  as  revolting.  It  is  indeed,  one  of  the 
most  painful  and  childish  of  sacred  myths  ;  yet  remember, 
ludicrous  and  ugly  as  it  seems  to  us,  this  story  satisfied  the 
fancy  of  the  Athenian  people  in  their  highest  state  ;  and  if  it 
did  not  satisfy — yet  it  was  accepted  by,  all  later  mythologists  : 
you  may  also  remember  I  told  you  to  be  prepared  to  find  that, 
given  a  certain  degree  of  national  intellect,  the  ruder  the 
symbol,  the  deeper  would  be  its  purpose.  And  this  legend 
of  the  birth  of  Athena  is  the  central  myth  of  all  that  the 
Greeks  have  left  us  respecting  the  power  of  their  arts  ;  and  in 
it  they  have  expressed,  as  it  seemed  good  to  them,  the  most 
important  things  they  had  to  tell  us  on  these  matters.  We 
may  read  them  wrongly  ;  but  we  must  read  them  here,  if 
anywhere. 

72.  There  are  so  many  threads  to  be  gathered  up  in  the 
legend,  that  I  cannot  hope  to  put  it  before  you  in  total  clear- 
ness, but  I  will  take  main  points.  Athena  is  born  in  the 
island  of  Ehodes  ;  and  that  island  is  raised  out  of  the  sea  by 
Apollo,  after  he  had  been  left  without  inheritance  among  the 
gods.    Zeus*  would  have  cast  the  lot  again,  but  Apollo 

*  His  relations  with  the  two  great  Titans,  Themis  and  Mnemosyne, 
belong  to  another  group  of  myths.  The  father  of  Athena  is  the  lower 
and  nearer  physical  Zeus,  from  whom  Metis,  the  mother  of  Athena,  long 
withdraws  and  disguises  herself. 


IMAGINATION. 


329 


orders  the  golden -girdled  Lachesis  to  stretch  out  her  hands  ; 
and  not  now  by  chance  or  lot,  but  by  noble  enchantment,  the 
island  rises  out  of  the  sea. 

Physically,  this  represents  the  action  of  heat  and  light  on 
chaos,  especially  on  the  deep  sea.  It  is  the  "  Fiat  lux  "  of 
Genesis,  the  first  process  in  the  conquest  of  Fate  by  Har- 
mony. The  island  is  dedicated  to  the  Nymph  Khodos,  by 
whom  Apollo  has  the  seven  sons  who  teach  cro^corara  vorjfiara ; 
because  the  rose  is  the  most  beautiful  organism  existing  in 
matter  not  vital,  expressive  of  the  direct  action  of  light  on  the 
earth,  giving  lovely  form  and  colour  at  once  ;  (compare  the  use 
of  it  by  Dante  as  the  form  of  the  sainted  crowd  in  highest 
heaven)  and  remember  that,  therefore,  the  rose  is  in  the  Greek 
mind,  essentially  a  Doric  flower,  expressing  the  worship  of 
Light,  as  the  Iris  or  Ion  is  an  Ionic  one,  expressing  the  wor- 
ship of  the  Winds  and  Dew. 

73.  To  understand  the  agency  of  Hephaestus  at  the  birth  of 
Athena,  we  must  again  return  to  the  founding  of  the  arts  on 
agriculture  by  the  hand.  Before  you  can  cultivate  land  you 
must  clear  it ;  and  the  characteristic  weapon  of  Hephaestus, — 
which  is  as  much  his  attribute  as  the  trident  is  of  Poseidon, 
and  the  rhabdos  of  Hermes,  is  not,  as  you  would  have  ex^ 
pected,  the  hammer,  but  the  clearing-axe — the  doubled-edged 
TrkXtKv^  the  same  that  Calypso  gives  Ulysses  with  which  to  cut 
down  the  trees  for  his  home  voyage  ;  so  that  both  the  naval 
and  agricultural  strength  of  the  Athenians  are  expressed  by 
this  weapon,  with  which  they  had  to  hew  out  their  fortune. 
And  you  must  keep  in  mind  this  agriculturally  laborious 
character  of  Hephaestus,  even  when  he  is  most  distinctly  the 
god  of  serviceable  fire  ;  thus  Horace's  perfect  epithet  for  him 
"  aviclus "  expresses  at  once  the  devouring  eagerness  of  fire, 
and  the  zeal  of  progressive  labour,  for  Horace  gives  it  to  him 
when  he  is  fighting  against  the  giants.  And  this  rude  symbol 
of  his  cleaving  the  forehead  of  Zeus  with  the  axe,  and  giving 
birth  to  Athena  signifies,  indeed,  physically  the  thrilling 
power  of  heat  in  the  heavens,  rending  the  clouds,  and  giving 
birth  to  the  blue  air ;  but  far  more  deeply  it  signifies  the  sub- 
duing of  adverse  Fate  by  true  labour  ;  until,  out  of  the  chasm. 


330 


ARATRA  RENTE LIC L 


cleft  by  resolute  and  industrious  fortitude,  springs  the  Spirit 
of  Wisdom. 

74.  Here  (Fig.  4)  is  an  early  drawing  of  the  myth,  to  which 
I  shall  have  to  refer  afterwards  in  illustration  of  the  childish- 
ness of  the  Greek  mind  at  the  time  when  its  art-symbols 
were  first  fixed ;  but  it  is  of  peculiar  value,  because  the  phys- 
ical character  of  Vulcan,  as  fire,  is  indicated  by  his  wearing 
the  ivSpofxiSes  of  Hermes,  while  the  antagonism  of  Zeus,  as  the 
adverse  chaos,  either  of  cloud  or  of  fate,  is  shown  by  his 
striking  at  Hephsestus  with  his  thunderbolt.  But  Plate  IV. 
gives  you  (as  far  as  the  light  on  the  rounded  vase  will  allow 


Fig.  4. 

it  to  be  deciphered)  a  characteristic  representation  of  the. 
scene,  as  conceived  in  later  art. 

75.  I  told  you  in  a  former  lecture  of  this  course  that  the 
entire  Greek  intellect  was  in  a  childish  phase  as  compared 
to  that  of  modern  times.  Observe,  however,  childishness 
does  not  necessarily  imply  universal  inferiority:  there  may 
be  a  vigorous,  acute,  pure,  and  solemn  childhood,  and  there 
may  be  a  weak,  foul,  and  ridiculous  condition  of  advanced 
life  ;  but  the  one  is  still  essentially  the  childish,  and  the  other 
the  adult  phase  of  existence. 

76.  You  will  find,  then,  that  the  Greeks  were  the  first 
people  that  were  born  into  complete  humanity.  All  nations 
before  them  had  been,  and  all  around  them  still  were,  partly 


IMAGINATION. 


331 


Bavage,  bestial,  clay-encumbered,  inhuman ;  still  semi-goat,  or 
semi-ant,  or  semi-stone,  or  semi- cloud.  But  the  power  of  a 
new  spirit  came  upon  the  Greeks,  and  the  stones  were  filled 
with  breath,  and  the  clouds  clothed  with  flesh  ;  and  then 
came  the  great  spiritual  battle  between  the  Centaurs  and  Lap- 
ithse  ;  and  the  living  creatures  became  "Children  of  Men.75 
Taught,  yet  by  the  Centaur — sown,  as  they  knew,  in  the  fang 
— from  the  dappled  skin  of  the  brute,  from  the  leprous  scale 
of  the  serpent,  their  flesh  came  again  as  the  flesh  of  a  little 
child,  and  they  were  clean. 

Fix  your  mind  on  this  as  the  very  central  character  of  the 
Greek  race — the  being  born  pure  and  human  out  of  the  bru- 
tal misery  of  the  past,  and  looking  abroad,  for  the  first  time, 
with  their  children's  eyes,  wonderingly  open,  on  the  strange 
and  divine  world. 

77.  Make  some  effort  to  remember,  so  far  as  may  be  possi- 
ble to  you,  either  what  you  felt  in  yourselves  when  you  were 
young,  or  what  you  have  observed  in  other  children,  of  the 
action  of  thought  and  fancy.  Children  are  continually  repre- 
sented as  living  in  an  ideal  world  of  their  own.  So  far  as  I 
have  myself  observed,  the  distinctive  character  of  a  child  is  to 
live  always  in  the  tangible  present,  having  little  pleasure  in 
memory,  and  being  utterly  impatient  and  tormented  by  antic- 
ipation :  weak  alike  in  reflection  and  forethought,  but  having 
an  intense  possession  of  the  actual  present,  do  wn  to  the  short- 
est moments  and  least  objects  of  it  ;  possessing  it,  indeed,  so 
intensely  that  the  sweet  childish  days  are  as  long  as  twenty 
days  will  be  ;  and  setting  all  the  faculties  of  heart  and  imag- 
ination on  little  things,  so  as  to  be  able  to  make  anything  out 
of  them  he  chooses.  Confined  to  a  little  garden,  he  does  not 
imagine  himself  somewhere  else,  but  makes  a  great  garden 
out. of  that ;  possessed  of  an  acorn-cup,  he  will  not  despise  it 
and  throw  it  away,  and  covet  a  golden  one  in  its  stead  :  it  is 
the  adult  who  does  so.  The  child  keeps  his  acorn-cup  as  a 
treasure,  and  makes  a  golden  one  out  of  it  in  his  mind  ;  so 
that  the  wondering  grown-up  person  standing  beside  him  is 
always  tempted  to  ask  concerning  his  treasures,  not,  "What 
would  you  have  more  than  these?"  but  "  What  possibly  can 


332 


ARATRA  RENTE LIC I 


you  see  in  these  ?  "  for,  to  the  bystander,  there  is  a  ludicrous 
and  incomprehensible  inconsistency  between  the  child's  words 
and  the  reality.  The  little  thing  tells  him  gravely,  holding 
up  the  acorn-cup,  that  "this  is  a  queen's  crown,  or  a  fairy's 
boat,"  and,  with  beautiful  effrontery,  expects  him  to  believe 
the  same.  Bat  observe — the  acorn-cup  must  be  there,  and  iu 
his  own  hand.  "  Give  it  me  ; "  then  I  will  make  more  of  it 
for  myself.    That  is  the  child's  one  word,  always. 


Fig.  5. 


78.  It  is  also  the  one  word  of  the  Greek — "  Give  it  me.57 
Give  me  any  thing  definite  here  in  my  sight,  then  I  will  make 
more  of  it. 

I  cannot  easily  express  to  you  how  strange  it  seems  to  me 
that  I  am  obliged,  here  in  Oxford,  to  take  the  position  of  an 
apologist  for  Greek  art ;  that  I  find,  in  spite  of  all  the  devo- 
tion of  the  admirable  scholars  who  have  so  long  maintained 


IMAGINATION. 


333 


in  our  public  schools  the  authority  of  Greek  literature,  our 
younger  students  take  no  interest  in  the  manual  work  of  the 
people  upon  whose  thoughts  the  tone  of  their  early  intellect- 
ual life  has  exclusively  depended.  But  I  am  not  surprised 
that  the  interest,  if  awakened,  should  not  at  first  take  the 
form  of  admiration.  The  inconsistency  between  an  Homeric 
description  of  a  piece  of  furniture  or  armour,  and  the  actual 
rudeness  of  any  piece  of  art  approximating  within  even  three 
or  four  centuries,  to  the  Homeric  period,  is  so  great,  that  we 
at  first  cannot  recognize  the  art  as  elucidatory  of,  or  in  any 
way  related  to,  the  poetic  language. 

79.  You  will  find,  however,  exactly  the  same  kind  of  dis- 
crepancy between  early  sculpture,  and  the  languages  of  deed 
and  thought,  in  the  second  birth,  and  childhood,  of  the 
world,  under  Christian^.  The  same  fair  thoughts  and  bright 
imaginations  arise  again  ;  and  similarly,  the  fancy  is  content 
with  the  rudest  symbols  by  which  they  can  be  formalized  to 
the  eyes.  You  cannot  understand  that  the  rigid  figure  (2) 
with  chequers  or  spots  on  its  breast,  and  sharp  lines  of 
drapery  to  its  feet,  could  represent,  to  the  Greek,  the  healing 
majesty  of  heaven  :  but  can  you  any  better  understand  how  a 
symbol  so  haggard  as  this  (Fig.  5)  could  represent  to  the 
noblest  hearts  of  the  Christian  ages  the  power  and  ministra- 
tion of  angels  ?  Yet  it  not  only  did  so,  but  retained  in  the 
rude  undulatory  and  linear  ornamentation  of  its  dress,  record 
of  the  thoughts  intended  to  be  conveyed  by  the  spotted  a3gis 
and  falling  chiton  of  Athena,  eighteen  hundred  years  before. 
Greek  and  Venetian  alike,  in  their  noble  childhood,  knew  with 
the  same  terror  the  coiling  wind  and  congealed  hail  in  heaven 
— saw  with  the  same  thankfulness  the  dew  shed  softly  on  the 
earth,  and  on  its  flowers  ;  and  both  recognized,  ruling  these, 
and  symbolized  by  them,  the  great  helpful  spirit  of  Wisdom, 
which  leads  the  children  of  men  to  all  knowledge,  all  courage, 
and  all  art. 

80.  Bead  the  inscription  written  on  the  sarcophagus  (Plate 
V.),  at  the  extremity  of  which  this  angel  is  sculptured.  It 
stands  in  an  open  recess  in  the  rude  brick  wall  of  the  west 
front  of  the  church  of  St.  John  and  Paul  at  Venice,  being  the 


334 


All  ATE  A  PENT E LIC L 


tomb  of  the  two  doges,  father  and  son,  Jacopo  and  Lorenza 
Tiepolo.    This  is  the  inscription  : — 

"  Quos  n at ura  pares  studiis,  virtutibus,  arte 
Edidit,  illustres  genitor  natusque,  sepulti 
Hac  sub  rupe  Duces.    Venetum  charissima  proles 
Theupula  collatis  dedit  hos  celebranda  triuniphis. 
Omnia  presentis  donavit  predia  templi 
Dux  Jacobus  :  valido  nxit  moderamine  leges 
Urbis,  et  ingratam  redimens  certamine  Jadram 
Dalmatiosque  dedit  patrie,  post,  Marte  subactas 
Graiorum  pelago  maculavit  sanguine  classes. 
Suscipit  oblatos  princeps  Laurentius  Istros, 
Et  domuit  rigidos,  ingenti  strage  cadentes, 
Bononie  populos.    Hinc  subdita  Cervia  cessit. 
Fundavere  vias  pacis  ;  fortique  relicta 
Re,  superos  sacris  petierunt  mentibus  ambo. 

•4  Dominus  Jacliobus  liobiit  *  M.CCLI.    Dominus  Laurentius  hobiit 

M.CCLXXVIII." 

You  see,  therefore,  this  tomb  is  an  invaluable  example  of 
thirteenth  century  sculpture  in  Venice.  In  Plate  VI,  you 
have  an  example  of  the  (coin)  sculpture  of  the  date  accurately 
corresponding  in  Greece  to  the  thirteenth  century  in  Venice, 
when  the  meaning  of  symbols  was  everything  and  the  work- 
manship comparatively  nothing.  The  upper  head  is  an  Athena, 
of  Athenian  work  in  the  seventh  or  sixth  century — (the  coin 
itself  may  have  been  struck  later,  but  the  archaic  type  was  re- 
tained). The  two  smaller  impressions  below  are  the  front  and 
obverse  of  a  coin  of  the  same  age  from  Corinth,  the  head  of 
Athena  on  one  side,  and  Pegasus,  with  the  archaic  Koppa,  on 
the  other.  The  smaller  head  is  bare,  the  hair  being  looped 
up  at  the  back  and  closely  bound  with  an  olive  branch.  You 
are  to  note  this  general  outline  of  the  head,  already  given  in 
a  more  finished  type  in  Plate  II.,  as  a  most  important  element- 
ary form  in  the  finest  sculpture,  not  of  Greece  only,  but  of  all 
Christendom.  In  the  upper  head  the  hair  is  restrained  still 
more  closely  by  a  round  helmet,  for  the  most  part  smooth, 

*  The  Latin  verses  are  of  later  date  ;  the  contemporary  plain  prose  re- 
tains the  Venetian  gutturals  and  aspirates. 


Plate  VI.— Archaic  Athena  op  Athens  and  Corinth. 


IMAGINATION. 


but  embossed  with  a  single  flower  tendril,  having  one  bud, 
one  flower,  and  above  it,  two  olive  leaves.  You  have  thus  the 
most  absolutely  restricted  symbol  possible  to  human  thought 
of  the  power  of  Athena  over  the  flowers  and  trees  of  the  earth. 
An  olive  leaf  by  itself  could  not  have  stood  for  the  sign  of  a 
tree,  but  the  two  can,  when  set  in  position  of  growth. 

I  would  not  give  you  the  reverse  of  the  coin  on  the  same 
plate,  because  you  would  have  looked  at  it  only,  laughed  at  it, 
and  not  examined  the  rest ;  but  here  it  is,  wonderfully  en- 
graved for  you  (Fig.  6)  :  of  it  we 
shall  have  more  to  say  afterwards. 

81.  And  now  as  you  look  at  these 
rude  vestiges  of  the  religion  of 
Greece,  and  at  the  vestiges,  still 
ruder,  on  the  Ducal  tomb,  of  the 
religion  of  Christendom,  take  warn- 
ing against  two  opposite  errors. 

There  is  a  school  of  teachers  who 
will  tell  you  that  nothing  but  Greek 
art  is  deserving  of  study,  and  that 
all  our  work  at  this  day  should  be  an  imitation  of  it. 

Whenever  you  feel  tempted  to  believe  them,  think  of  these 
portraits  of  Athena  and  her  owl,  and  be  assured  that  Greek 
art  is  not  in  all  respects  perfect,  nor  exclusively  deserving  of 
imitation. 

There  is  another  school  of  teachers  who  will  tell  you  that 
Greek  art  is  good  for  nothing  ;  that  the  soul  of  the  Greek  was 
outcast,  and  that  Christianity  entirely  superseded  its  faith, 
and  excelled  its  works. 

Whenever  you  feel  tempted  to  believe  them,  think  of  this 
angel  on  the  tomb  of  Jacopo  Tiepolo  ;  and  remember,  that 
Christianity,  after  it  had  been  twelve  hundred  years  existent 
as  an  imaginative  power  on  the  earth,  could  do  no  better  work 
than  this,  though  with  all  the  former  power  of  Greece  to  help 
it ;  nor  was  able  to  engrave  its  triumph  in  having  stained  its 
fleets  in  the  seas  of  Greece  with  the  blood  of  her  people,  but 
between  barbarous  imitations  of  the  pillars  which  that  people 
had  invented. 


A  RATE  A  PENTELICL 


82.  Receiving  these  two  warnings,  receive  also  this  lesson. 
In  both  examples,  childish  though  it  be,  this  Heathen  and 
Christian  art  is  alike  sincere,  and  alike  vividly  imaginative  : 
the  actual  work  is  that  of  infancy  ;  the  thoughts,  in  their  vi- 
sionaiy  simplicity,  are  also  the  thoughts  of  infancy,  but  in 
their  solemn  virtue,  they  are  the  thoughts  of  men. 

We,  on  the  contrary,  are  now,  in  all  that  we  do,  absolutely 
without  sincerity  ; — absolutely,  therefore,  without  imagina- 
tion, and  without  virtue.  Our  hands  are  dexterous  with  the 
vile  and  deadly  dexterity  of  machines  ;  our  minds  filled  with 
incoherent  fragments  of  faith,  which  we  cling  to  in  coward- 
ice, without  believing,  and  make  pictures  of  in  vanity,  with- 
out loving.  False  and  base  alike,  whether  we  admire  or  imi- 
tate, we  cannot  learn  from  the  Heathen's  art,  but  only  pilfer 
it ;  we  cannot  revive  the  Christian's  art,  but  only  galvanize  it ; 
we  are,  in  the  sum  of  us,  not  human  artists  at  all,  but  mechan- 
isms of  conceited  clay,  masked  in  the  furs  and  feathers  of  liv- 
ing creatures,  and  convulsed  with  voltaic  spasms,  in  mockery 
of  animation. 

83.  You  think,  perhaps,  that  I  am  using  terms  unjustifiable 
in  violence.  They  would,  indeed,  be  unjustifiable,  if,  spoken 
from  this  chair,  they  were  violent  at  all.  They  are,  unhap- 
pily, temperate  and  accurate, — except  in  shortcoming  of  blame. 
For  we  are  not  only  impotent  to  restore,  but  strong  to  defile, 
the  work  of  past  ages.  Of  the  impotence,  take  but  this  one, 
utterly  humiliatory,  and,  in  the  full  meaning  of  it,  ghastly, 
example.  We  have  lately  been  busy  embanking,  in  the  cap- 
ital of  the  country,  the  river  which,  of  all  its  waters,  the  im- 
agination of  our  ancestors  had  made  most  sacred,  and  the 
bounty  of  nature  most  useful.  Of  all  architectural  features  of 
the  metropolis,  that  embankment  will  be,  in  future,  the  most 
conspicuous  ;  and  in  its  position  and  purpose  it  was  the  most 
capable  of  noble  adornment. 

For  that  adornment,  nevertheless,  the  utmost  which  our 
modern  poetical  imagination  has  been  able  to  invent,  is  a  row 
of  gas-lamps.  It  has,  indeed,  farther  suggested  itself  to  our 
minds  as  appropriate  to  gas-lamps  set  beside  a  river,  that  the 
gas  should  come  out  of  fishes'  tails  ;  but  we  have  not  ingenuity 


IMAGINATION. 


337 


enough  to  cast  so  much  as  a  smelt  or  a  sprat  for  ourselves ; 
so  we  borrow  the  shape  of  a  Neapolitan  marble,  which  has 
been  the  refuse  of  the  plate  and  candlestick  shops  in  every 
capital  of  Europe  for  the  last  fifty  years.  We  cast  that  badly, 
and  give  lustre  to  the  ill-cast  fish  with  lacquer  in  imitation  of 
bronze.  On  the  base  of  their  pedestals,  towards  the  road, 
we  put  for  advertisement's  sake,  the  initials  of  the  casting 
firm  ;  and,  for  farther  originality  and  Christianity's  sake,  the 
caduceus  of  Mercury ;  and  to  adorn  the  front  of  the  pedestals 
towards  the  river,  being  now  wholly  at  our  wit's  end,  we 
can  think  of  nothing  better  than  to  borrow  the  door-knocker 
which — again  for  the  last  fifty  years — has  disturbed  and  dec- 
orated two  or  three  millions  of  London  street-doors ;  and 
magnifying  the  marvellous  device  of  it,  a  lion's  head  with  a 
ring  in  its  mouth  (still  borrowed  from  the  Greek),  we  complete 
the  embankment  with  a  row  of  heads  and  rings,  on  a  scale 
which  enables  them  to  produce,  at  the  distance  at  which  only 
they  can  be  seen,  the  exact  effect  of  a  row  of  sentryboxes. 

84.  Farther.  In  the  very  centre  of  the  city,  and  at  the 
point  where  the  Embankment  commands  a  view  of  Westmin- 
ster Abbey  on  one  side  and  of  St.  Paul's  on  the  other — that  is 
to  say,  at  precisely  the  most  important  and  stately  moment 
of  its  whole  course — it  has  to  pass  under  one  of  the  arches  of 
Waterloo  Bridge,  which,  in  the  sweep  of  its  curve,  is  as  vast 
— it  alone — as  the  Riaito  at  Venice,  and  scarcely  less  seemly 
in  proportions.  But  over  the  Riaito.  though  of  late  and  de- 
based Venetian  work,  there  still  reigns  some  power  of  human 
imagination  :  on  the  two  flanks  of  it  are  carved  the  Virgin 
and  the  Angel  of  the  Annunciation  ;  on  the  keystone  the  de- 
scending Dove.  It  is  not,  indeed,  the  fault  of  living  designers 
that  the  Waterloo  arch  is  nothing  more  thaD  a  gloom}'  and 
hollow  heap  of  wedged  blocks  of  blind  granite.  But  just 
beyond  the  damp  shadow  of  it,  the  new  Embankment  is 
reached  by  a  flight  of  stairs,  which  are,  in  point  of  fact,  the 
principal  approach  to  it,  a-foot,  from  central  London  ;  the  de- 
scent from  the  very  midst  of  the  metropolis  of  England  to 
the  banks  of  the  chief  river  of  England  ;  and  for  this  ap- 
proach, living  designers  are  answerable. 


AH  ATE  A  PENTELICL 


85.  The  principal  decoration  of  the  descent  is  again  a  gas- 
lamp,  but  a  shattered  one,  with  a  brass  crown  on  the  top  of 
it  or,  rather,  half-crown,  and  that  turned  the  wrong  way,  the 
back  of  it  to  the  river  and  causeway,  its  flame  supplied  by  a 
visible  pipe  far  wandering  along  the  wall ;  the  wThole  appa- 
ratus being  supported  by  a  rough  cross-beam.  Fastened  to 
the  centre  of  the  arch  above  is  a  large  placard,  stating  that 
the  Royal  Humane  Society's  drags  are  in  constant  readiness, 
and  that  their  office  is  at  4,  Trafalgar  Square.  On  each  side 
of  the  arch  are  temporary,  but  dismally  old  and  battered 
boardings,  across  two  angles  capable  of  unseemly  use  by  the 
British  public.  Above  one  of  these  is  another  placard,  stat- 
ing that  this  is  the  Victoria  Embankment.  The  steps  them- 
selves— some  forty  of  them — descend  under  a  tunnel,  which 
the  shattered  gas-lamp  lights  by  night,  and  nothing  by  day. 
They  are  covered  with  filthy  dust,  shaken  off  from  infinitude 
of  filthy  feet  ;  mixed  up  with  shreds  of  paper,  orange-peel, 
foul  straw,  rags,  and  cigar  ends,  and  ashes  ;  the  whole  agglu- 
tinated, more  or  less,  by  dry  saliva  into  slippery  blotches  and 
patches  ;  or,  when  not  so  fastened,  blown  dismally  by  the 
sooty  wind  hither  and  thither,  or  into  the  faces  of  those  who 
ascend  and  descend.  The  place  is  worth  your  visit,  for  you 
are  not  likely  to  find  elsewhere  a  spot  which,  either  in  costly 
and  ponderous  brutality  of  building,  or  in  the  squalid  and 
indecent  accompaniment  of  it,  is  so  far  separated  from  the 
peace  and  grace  of  nature,  and  so  accurately  indicative  of  the 
methods  of  our  national  resistance  to  the  Grace,  Mercy,  and 
Peace  of  Heaven. 

86.  I  am  obliged  always  to  use  the  English  word  "  Grace  " 
in  two  senses,  but  remember  that  the  Greek  x^Pt?  includes 
them  both  (the  bestowing,  that  is  to  say  of  Beauty  and 
Mercy)  ;  and  especially  it  includes  these  in  the  passage  of 
Pindar's  first  ode,  which  gives  us  the  key  to  the  right  inter- 
pretation of  the  power  of  sculpture  in  Greece.  You  remem- 
ber that  I  told  you,  in  my  Sixth  Introductory  Lecture  (§  151), 
that  the  mythic  accounts  of  Greek  sculpture  begin  in  the 
legends  of  the  family  of  Tantalus  ;  and  especially  in  the  most 
grotesque  legend  of  them  all,  the  inlaying  of  the  ivory  shoul 


IMAGINATION. 


339 


der  of  Pelops.  At  that  story  Pindar  pauses — not,  indeed, 
without  admiration,  nor  alleging  any  impossibility  in  the  cir- 
cumstances themselves,  but  doubting  the  careless  hunger  of 
Demeter — and  gives  his  own  reading  of  the  event,  instead  of 
the  ancient  one.  He  justifies  this  to  himself,  and  to  his  hear- 
ers, by  the  plea  that  myths  have,  in  some  sort,  or  degree, 
(ttov  rt),  led  the  mind  of  mortals  beyond  the  truth  :  and  then 
he  goes  on  : — 

"  Grace,  which  creates  everything  that  is  kindly  and  sooth- 
ing for  mortals,  adding  honour,  has  often  made  things  at  first 
untrustworthy,  become  trustworthy  through  Love." 

87.  I  cannot,  except  in  these  lengthened  terms,  give  you 
the  complete  force  of  the  passage  ;  especially  of  the  aiua-rov 
ifxrja-aTo  ttlcftov — "  made  it  trustworthy  by  passionate  desire 
that  it  should  be  so  " — which  exactly  describes  the  temper  of 
religious  persons  at  the  present  day,  who  are  kindly  and  sin- 
cere, in  clinging  to  the  forms  of  faith  which  either  have  long- 
been  precious  to  themselves,  or  which  they  feel  to  have  been 
without  question  instrumental  in  advancing  the  dignity  of 
mankind.  And  it  is  part  of  the  constitution  of  humanity — a 
part  which,  above  others,  you  are  in  danger  of  unwisely  con- 
temning under  the  existing  conditions  of  our  knowledge,  that 
the  things  thus  sought  for  belief  with  eager  passion,  do, 
indeed,  become  trustworthy  to  us  ;  that,  to  each  of  us,  they 
verily  become  what  we  would  have  them  ;  the  force  of  the 
fjirjvLs  and  /JLvrjiJLr]  with  which  we  seek  after  them,  does,  indeed, 
make  them  powerful  to  us  for  actual  good  or  evil ;  and  it  is 
thus  granted  to  us  to  create  not  only  with  our  hands  things 
that  exalt  or  degrade  our  sight,  but  with  our  hearts  also, 
things  that  exalt  or  degrade  our  souls  ;  giving  true  substance 
to  all  that  we  hoped  for  ;  evidence  to  things  that  we  have  not 
seen,  but  have  desired  to  see ;  and  calling,  in  the  sense  oi 
creating,  things  that  are  not,  as  though  they  were. 

88.  You  remember  that  in  distinguishing  Imagination  from 
Idolatry,  I  referred  you  to  the  forms  of  passionate  affection 
with  which  a  noble  people  commonly  regards  the  rivers  and 
springs  of  its  native  land.  Some  conception  of  personality 
or  of  spiritual  power  in  the  stream,  is  almost  necessarily  in* 


VAO 


ARATRA  PEN  TEL  TCI. 


volvecl  in  such  emotion  ;  and  prolonged  x°-PL(;  *n  the  form  of 
gratitude,  the  return  of  Love  for  benefits  continually  bestowed, 
at  last  alike  in  all  the  highest  and  the  simplest  minds,  when 
they  are  honourable  and  pure,  makes  this  untrue  thing  trust- 
worthy ;  amcTTov  ifxrjoraro  ttlcttov,  until  it  becomes  to  them  the 
safe  basis  of  some  of  the  happiest  impulses  of  their  moral 
nature.  Next  to  the  marbles  of  Verona,  given  you  as  a  primal 
type  of  the  sculpture  of  Christianity,  moved  to  its  best  energy 
in  adorning  the  entrance  of  its  temples,  I  have  not  unwillingly 
placed,  as  your  introduction  to  the  best  sculpture  of  the  re- 
ligion of  Greece,  the  forms  under  which  it  represented  the 
personality  of  the  fountain  Arethusa.  But,  without  restriction 
to  those  days  of  absolute  devotion,  let  me  simply  point  out  to 
you  how  this  untrue  thing,  made  true  by  Love,  has  intimate 
and  heavenly  authority  even  over  the  minds  of  men  of  the 
most  practical  sense,  the  most  shrewrd  wit,  and  the  most 
severe  precision  of  moral  temper.  The  fair  vision  of  Sabrina 
in  Comus,  the  endearing  and  tender  promise,  "  Fies  nobilium 
tu  quoque  fontium,''  and  the  joyful  and  proud  affection  of  the 
great  Lombard's  address  to  the  lakes  of  his  enchanted  land, — 

Te,  Lari  maxume,  teque 
Fluctibus  et  fremitu  assurgens,  Benace,  marino, 

may  surely  be  remembered  by  you  with  regretful  piety,  when 
you  stand  by  the  blank  stones  which  at  once  restrain  and  dis- 
grace your  native  river,  as  the  final  worship  rendered  to  it  by 
modern  philosophy.  But  a  little  incident  which  I  saw  last 
summer  on  its  bridge  at  Wallingford,  may  put  the  contrast  of 
ancient  and  modern  feeling  before  you  still  more  forcibly. 

89.  Those  of  you  who  have  read  with  attention  (none  of 
us  can  read  with  too  much  attention),  Moliere's  most  perfect 
work,  the  Misanthrope,  must  remember  Celimene's  description 
of  her  lovers,  and  her  excellent  reason  for  being  unable  to  re- 
gard with  any  favour,  "  notre  grand  flandrin  de  vicomte, — 
depuis  que  je  1'ai  vu,  trois  quarts  d'heure  durant,  cracher  dans 
un  puits  pour  faire  des  ronds."  That  sentence  is  worth  noting, 
both  in  contrast  to  the  reverence  paid  by  the  ancients  to  wells 
and  springs,  and  as  one  of  the  most  interesting  traces  of  the 


IMAGINATION. 


extension  of  the  loathsome  habit  among  the  upper  classes  of 
Europe  and  America,  which  now  renders  all  external  grace, 
dignity,  and  decency,  impossible  in  the  thoroughfares  of  their 
principal  cities.  In  connection  wish  that  sentence  of  Moliere's 
you  may  advisably  also  remember  this  fact,  which  I  chanced 
to  notice  on  the  bridge  of  V/ allingf ord.  I  was  walking  from 
end  to  end  of  it,  and  back  again,  one  Sunday  afternoon  of  last 
May,  trying  to  conjecture  what  had  made  this  especial  bend 
and  ford  of  the  Thames  so  important  in  all  the  Anglo-Saxon 
wars.  It  was  one  of  the  few  sunny  afternoons  of  the  bitter 
spring,  and  I  was  very  thankful  for  its  light,  and  happy  in 
watching  beneath  it  the  flow  and  the  glittering  of  the  classical 
river,  when  I  noticed  a  well-dressed  boy,  apparently  just  out 
of  some  orderly  Sunday-school,  leaning  far  over  the  parapet ; 
watching,  as  I  conjectured,  some  bird  or  insect  on  the  bridge- 
buttress.  I  went  up  to  him  to  see  what  he  was  looking  at ; 
but  just  as  I  got  close  to  him,  he  started  over  to  the  opposite 
parapet,  and  put  himself  there  into  the  same  position,  his  ob- 
ject being,  as  I  then  perceived,  to  spit  from  both  sides  upon 
the  heads  of  a  pleasure  party  who  were  passing  in  a  boat 
below. 

90.  The  incident  may  seem  to  you  too  trivial  to  be  noticed 
in  this  place.  To  me,  gentlemen,  it  was  by  no  means  trivial. 
It  meant,  in  the  depth  of  it,  such  absence  of  all  true  x^p  S 
reverence,  and  intellect,  as  it  is  very  dreadful  to  trace  in  the 
mind  of  any  human  creature,  much  more  in  that  of  a  child 
educated  with  apparently  every  advantage  of  circumstance  in 
a  beautiful  English  country  town,  within  ten  miles  of  our 
University.  Most  of  ail,  is  it  terrific  when  we  regard  it  as  the 
exponent  (and  this,  in  truth,  it  is),  of  the  temper  which,  as 
distinguished  from  former  methods,  either  of  discipline  or 
recreation,  the  present  tenor  of  our  general  teaching  fosters 
in  the  mind  of  youth  ; — teaching  which  asserts  liberty  to  be  a 
right,  and  obedience  a  degradation  ;  and  which,  regardless 
alike  of  the  fairness  of  nature  and  the  grace  of  behaviour, 
leaves  the  insolent  spirit  and  degraded  senses  to  find  their 
only  occupation  in  malice,  and  their  only  satisfaction  iq 
shame. 


342 


ABATRA  PENTELW1. 


91.  You  will,  I  hope,  proceed  with  me,  not  scornfully  any 

more,  to  trace,  in  the  early  art  of  a  noble  heathen  nation,  the 
feeling  of  what  wTas  at  least  a  better  childishness  than  this  of 
ours  ;  and  the  efforts  to  express,  though  with  hands  yet  fail- 
ing, and  minds  oppressed  by  ignorant  phantasy,  the  first  truth 
by  which  they  knew  that  they  lived  ;  the  birth  of  wisdom  and 
of  all  her  powers  of  help  to  man,  as  the  reward  of  his  resolute 
labour. 

92.  "'A^ato-rov  Tixvaio-L."  Note  that  word  of  Pindar  in  the 
Seventh  Olympic.  This  axe-blow  of  Vulcan's  was  to  the 
Greek  mind  truly  what  Clyternnestra  falsely  asserts  hers  to 
have  been  "t?/s  8e  Sefias  x€P°?'  Zpyov,  Stxatas  t€/ctovos"  ;  physi- 
cally, it  meant  the  opening  of  the  blue  through  the  rent  clouds 
of  heaven,  by  the  action  of  local  terrestrial  heat  (of  Hephaestus 
as  opposed  to  Apollo,  who  shines  on  the  surface  of  the  upper 
clouds,  but  cannot  pierce  them  ;  and,  spiritually,  it  meant  the 
first  birth  of  prudent  thought  out  of  rude  labour,  the  clear- 
ing-axe in  the  hand  of  the  woodman  being  the  practical  ele- 
mentary sign  of  his  difference  from  the  wild  animals  of  the 
wood.  Then  he  goes  on,  "  From  the  high  head  of  her  Father, 
Athenaia  rushing  forth,  cried  with  her  great  and  exceeding 
cry  ;  and  the  Heaven  trembled  at  her,  and  the  Earth  Mother." 
The  cry  of  Athena,  I  have  before  pointed  out,  physically  dis- 
tinguishes her,  as  the  spirit  of  the  air.  from  silent  elemental 
powers  ;  but  in  this  grand  passage  of  Pindar  it  is  again  the 
mythic  cry  of  which  he  thinks  ;  that  is  to  say,  the  giving 
articulate  words,  by  intelligence,  to  the  silence  of  Fate. 
"  Wisdom  crieth  aloud,  she  uttereth  her  voice  in  the  streets," 
and  Heaven  and  Earth  tremble  at  her  reproof. 

93.  Uttereth  her  voice  in  "  the  streets."  For  all  men,  that 
is  to  say ;  but  to  what  work  did  the  Greeks  think  that  her 
Yoice  was  to  call  them  ?  What  was  to  be  the  impulse  com- 
municated by  her  prevailing  presence  ;  what  the  sign  of  the 
people's  obedience  to  her  ? 

This  was  to  be  the  sign — "But  she,  the  goddess  herself, 
gave  to  them  to  prevail  over  the  dwellers  upon  earth,  with 
best-labouring  hands  in  every  art.  And  by  their  paths  there  were 
the  likenesses  of  living  and  of  creeping  things  ;  and  the  glory 


IMA  GUSTATION. 


343 


was  deep.  For  to  the  cunning  workman,  greater  knowledge 
comes,  undeceitful." 

94.  An  infinitely  pregnant  passage,  this,  of  which  to-day 
you  are  to  note  mainly  these  three  things  :  First,  that  Athena 
is  the  goddess  of  Doing,  not  at  all  of  sentimental  inaction. 
She  is  begotten,  as  it  were,  of  the  woodman's  axe  ;  her  purpose 
is  never  in  a  word  only,  but  in  a  word  and  a  blow.  She  guides 
the  hands  that  labour  best,  in  every  art. 

95.  Secondly.  The  victory  given  by  Wisdom,  the  worker,  to 
the  hands  that  labour  best,  is  that  the  streets  and  ways,  KiKevOoi, 
shall  be  filled  by  likenesses  of  living  and  creeping  things  ? 

Things  living,  and  creeping  !  Are  the  Reptile  things  not 
alive  then?  You  think  Pindar  wrote  that  carelessly?  or  that, 
if  he  had  only  known  a  little  modern  anatomy,  instead  of 
"  reptile  "  things,  he  would  have  said  "  monochondylous " 
things  ?  Be  patient,  and  let  us  attend  to  the  main  points 
first. 

Sculpture,  it  thus  appears,  is  the  only  work  of  wisdom  that 
the  Greeks  care  to  speak  of  ;  they  think  it  involves  and  crowns 
every  other.  Image-making  art ;  this  is  Athena's,  as  queen- 
liest  of  the  arts.  Literature,  the  order  and  the  strength  of 
word,  of  course  belongs  to  Apollo  and  the  Muses  ;  under 
Athena  are  the  Substances  and  the  Forms  of  things. 

96.  Thirdly.  By  this  forming  of  Images  there  is  to  be 
gained  a  "deep  " — that  is  to  say — a  weighty,  and  prevailing, 
glory  ;  not  a  floating  nor  fugitive  one.  For  to  the  cunning 
workman,  greater  knowledge  comes,  "undeceitful." 

"  AaeVri-  "  I  am  forced  to  use  two  English  words  to  trans- 
late that  single  Greek  one.  The  " cunning"  workman, 
thoughtful  in  experience,  touch,  and  vision  of  the  thing  to  be 
done  ;  no  machine,  witless,  and  of  necessary  motion  ;  yet  not 
cunning  only,  but  having  perfect  habitual  skill  of  hand  also  ; 
the  confirmed  reward  of  truthful  doing.  Recollect,  in  con- 
nection with  this  passage  of  Pindar,  Homer's  three  verses 
about  getting  the  lines  of  ship-timber  true,  (//.  xv.  410) 

"  'AAA'  a>crr€  (TrdOfXT)  Bopv  v^'iov  zfyQvvsi 

tgktovos  €u  ira\oL}XYi<JL  dayfiovos,  os  pd  re  7rc(a'7js 
eldy  (ro(pl7]Sj  vicodi)luoo'vi'r}(riv  'AOrfcijs," 


344 


All  A  TRA  PENTEL1CL 


and  the  beautiful  epitliet  of  Persephone,  <c  Sacipa?"  as  tha 
Tryer  and  Knower  of  good  work  ;  and  remembering  these, 
trust  Pindar  for  the  truth  of  his  saying,  that  to  the  cunning 
workman — (and  let  me  solemnly  enforce  the  words  by  adding 
— that  to  him  only,)  knowledge  comes  undeceitful. 

97.  You  may  have  noticed,  perhaps,  and  with  a  smile,  as 
one  of  the  paradoxes  you  often  hear  me  blamed  for  too  fondly 
stating,  what  I  told  you  in  the  close  of  my  Third  Introductory 
Lecture,  that  "so  far  from  art's  being  immoral,  little  else  ex- 
cept art  is  moral."  I  have  now  farther  to  tell  you,  that  little 
else,  except  art,  is  wise  ;  that  all  knowledge,  unaccompanied 
by  a  habit  of  useful  action,  is  too  likely  to  become  deceitful, 
and  that  every  habit  of  useful  action  must  resolve  itself  into 
some  elementary  practice  of  manual  labour.  And  I  would,  in 
all  sober  and  direct  earnestness  advise  you,  whatever  may  be 
the  aim,  predilection,  or  necessity  of  your  lives,  to  resolve 
upon  this  one  thing  at  least,  that  you  will  enable  yourselves 
daily  to  do  actually  with  your  hands,  something  that  is  useful 
to  mankind.  To  do  anything  well  with  your  hands,  useful 
or  not ; — to  be,  even  in  trifling,  TraXafxrjo-i  Sarjfxwv,  is  already 
much  ; — when  we  come  to  examine  the  art  of  the  middle  ages 
I  shall  be  able  to  show-  you  that  the  strongest  of  all  influences 
of  right  then  brought  to  bear  upon  character  was  the  neces- 
sity for  exquisite  manual  dexterity  in  the  management  of  the 
spear  and  bridle  ;  and  in  your  own  experience  most  of  you 
will  be  able  to  recognize  the  wholesome  effect,  alike  on  body 
and  mind,  of  striving,  within  proper  limits  of  time,  to  become 
either  good  batsmen,  or  good  oarsmen.  But  the  bat  and  the 
racer's  oar  are  children's  toys.  Eesolve  that  you  will  be  men 
in  usefulness,  as  well  as  in  strength  ;  and  you  will  find  that 
then  also,  but  not  till  then,  you  can  become  men  in  under- 
standing ;  and  that  every  fine  vision  and  subtle  theorem  will 
present  itself  to  you  thenceforward  undeceitfuliy,  vTroOrjfxoavvrjaiv 

98.  But  there  is  more  to  be  gathered  yet  from  the  words  of 
Pindar.  He  is  thinking,  in  his  brief,  intense  way,  at  once  of 
Athena's  work  on  the  soul,  and  of  her  literal  power  on  the 
dust  of  the  Earth.    His  "  KiktvdoL "  is  a  wide  word  meaning  all 


IMAGINATION. 


3d5 


the  paths  of  sea  and  land.  Consider,  therefore,  what  Athena's 
own  work  actually  is — in  the  literal  fact  of  it.  The  blue,  clear 
air  is  the  sculpturing  power  upon  the  earth  and  sea.  Where 
the  surface  of  the  earth  is  reached  by  that,  and  its  matter  and 
substance  inspired  with,  and  filled  by  that,  organic  form  be- 
comes possible.  You  must  indeed  have  the  sun,  also,  and 
moisture  ;  the  kingdom  of  Apollo  risen  out  of  the  sea :  but 
the  sculpturing  of  living  things,  shape  by  shape,  is  Athena's, 
so  that  under  the  brooding  spirit  of  the  air,  what  was  without 
form,  and  void  brings  forth  the  moving  creature  that  hath 
life. 

99.  That  is  her  work  then — the  giving  of  Form  ;  then  the 
separately  Apolline  wrork  is  the  giving  of  Light ;  or,  more 
strictly,  Sight :  giving  that  faculty  to  the  retina  to  which  we 
owe  not  merely  the  idea  of  light,  but  the  existence  of  it ;  for 
light  is  to  be  denned  only  as  the  sensation  produced  in  the  eye 
of  an  animal,  under  given  conditions ;  those  same  conditions 
being,  to  a  stone,  only  warmth  or  chemical  influence,  but  not 
light.  And  that  power  of  seeing,  and  the  other  various  per- 
sonalities and  authorities  of  the  animal  body,  in  pleasure  and 
pain,  have  never,  hitherto,  been,  I  do  not  say,  explained,  but 
in  any  wise  touched  or  approached  by  scientific  discovery. 
Some  of  the  conditions  of  mere  external  animal  form  and  of 
muscular  vitality  have  been  shown  ;  but  for  the  most  part  that 
is  true,  even  of  external  form,  which  I  wrote  six  years  ago. 
"  You  may  always  stand  by  Form  against  Force.  To  a  painter, 
the  essential  character  of  anything  is  the  form  of  it,  and  the 
philosophers  cannot  touch  that.  They  come  and  tell  you,  for 
instance,  that  there  is  as  much  heat,  or  motion,  or  calorific 
energy  (or  whatever  else  they  like  to  call  it),  in  a  tea-kettle,  as 
in  a  gier-eagle.  Very  good  :  that  is  so  ;  and  it  is  very  inter- 
esting. It  requires  just  as  much  heat  as  will  boil  the  kettle, 
to  take  the  gier-eagle  up  to  his  nest,  and  as  much  more  to 
bring  him  down  again  on  a  hare  or  a  partridge,  But  we 
painters,  acknowledging  the  equality  and  similarity  of  the 
kettle  and  the  bird  in  all  scientific  respects,  attach,  for  our 
part,  our  principal  interest  to  the  difference  in  their  forms. 
For  us,  the  primarily  cognisable  facts,  in  the  two  things,  are, 


346 


ABATE  A  PENTELIC1. 


that  the  kettle  has  a  spout,  and  the  eagle  a  beak  ;  the  one  a 
lid  on  its  back,  the  other  a  pair  of  wings  ;  not  to  speak  of  the 
distinction  also  of  volition,  which  the  philosophers  may  prop- 
erly call  merely  a  form  or  mode  of  force— but,  then  to  an  art- 
ist, the  form  or  mode  is  the  gist  of  the  business." 

100.  As  you  will  find  that  it  is,  not  to  the  artist  only,  but 
to  all  of  us.  The  laws  under  which  matter  is  collected  and 
constructed  are  the  same  throughout  the  universe  :  the  sub- 
stance so  collected,  whether  for  the  making  of  the  eagle,  or 
the  worm,  may  be  analyzed  into  gaseous  identity  ;  a  diffusive 
vital  force,  apparently  so  closely  related  to  mechanically  meas- 
urable heat  as  to  admit  the  conception  of  its  being  itself  me- 
chanically measurable,  and  unchanging  in  total  quantity,  ebbs 
and  flows  alike  through  the  limbs  of  men,  and  the  fibres  of 
insects.  But,  above  all  this,  and  ruling  every  grotesque  or 
degraded  accident  of  this,  are  two  laws  of  beauty  in  form, 
and  of  nobility  in  character,  wThich  stand  in  the  chaos  of  crea- 
tion between  the  Living  and  the  Dead,  to  separate  the  things 
that  have  in  them  a  sacred  and  helpful,  from  those  that  have 
in  them  an  accursed  and  destroying,  nature  ;  and  the  power 
of  Athena,  first  physically  put  forth  in  the  sculpturing  of  these 
£ooa  and  epnera,  these  living  and  reptile  things,  is  put  forth, 
finally,  in  enabling  the  hearts  of  men  to  discern  the  one  from 
the  other  ;  to  know  the  unquenchable  fires  of  the  Spirit  from 
the  unquenchable  fires  of  Death  ;  and  to  choose,  not  unaided, 
between  submission  to  the  Love  that  cannot  end,  'or  to  the 
Worm  that  cannot  die. 

101.  The  unconsciousness  of  their  antagonism  is  the  most 
notable  characteristic  of  the  modern  scientific  mind  ;  and  I 
believe  no  credulity  or  fallacy  admitted  by  the  weakness  (cr 
it  may  sometimes  rather  have  been  the  strength)  of  early  im- 
agination, indicates  so  strange  a  depression  beneath  the  due 
scale  of  human  intellect,  as  the  failure  of  the  sense  of  beauty 
in  form,  and  loss  of  faith  in  heroism  of  conduct,  which  have 
become  the  curses  of  recent  science,*  art,  and  policy. 

*  The  best  modern  illustrated  scientific  works  show  perfect  faculty  of 
representing  monkeys,  lizards,  and  insects  ;  absolute  incapability  of 
representing  either  a  man,  a  horse,  or  a  lion. 


IMAGINATION. 


347 


102.  That  depression  of  intellect  has  been  alike  exhibited 
in  the  mean  consternation  confessedly  felt  on  one  side,  and 
the  mean  triumph  apparently  felt  on  the  other,  during  the 
course  of  the  dispute  now  pending  as  to  the  origin  of  man. 
Dispute  for  the  present,  not  to  be  decided,  and  of  which  the 
decision  is  to  persons  in  the  modern  temper  of  mind,  wholly 
without  significance  :  and  I  earnestly  desire  that  you,  my 
pupils,  may  have  firmness  enough  to  disengage  your  energies 
from  investigation  so  premature  and  so  fruitless,  and  sense 
enough  to  perceive  that  it  does  not  matter  how  you  have 
been  made,  so  long  as  you  are  satisfied  with  being  what  you 
are.  If  you  are  dissatisfied  with  yourselves,  it  ought  not  to 
console,  but  humiliate  you,  to  imagine  that  you  were  once 
seraphs ;  and  if  you  are  pleased  with  yourselves,  it  is  not 
any  ground  of  reasonable  shame  to  you  if,  by  no  fault  of 
your  own,  you  have  passed  through  the  elementary  condition 
of  apes. 

103.  Kemember,  therefore,  that  it  is  of  the  very  highest  im- 
portance that  you  should  know  what  you  are,  and  determine 
to  be  the  best  that  you  may  be  ;  but  it  is  of  no  importance 
whatever,  except  as  it  may  contribute  to  that  end,  to  know 
what  you  have  been.  Whether  your  Creator  shaped  you  with 
fingers,  or  tools,  as  a  sculptor  would  a  lump  of  clay,  or  gradu- 
ally raised  you  to  manhood  through  a  series  of  inferior  forms, 
is  only  of  moment  to  you  in  this  respect— that  in  the  one  case 
you  cannot  expect  your  children  to  be  nobler  creatures  than 
you  are  yourselves — in  the  other,  every  act  and  thought  of 
your  present  life  may  be  hastening  the  advent  of  a  race  which 
will  look  back  to  you,  their  fathers  (and  you  ought  at  least 
to  have  attained  the  dignity  of  desiring  that  it  may  be  so), 
with  incredulous  disdain. 

104.  But  that  you  are  yourselves  capable  of  that  disdain 
and  dismay ;  that  you  are  ashamed  of  having  been  apes,  if 
you  ever  were  so ;  that  you  acknowledge  instinctively,  a 
relation  of  better  and  worse,  and  a  law  respecting  what  is 
noble  and  base,  which  makes  it  no  question  to  you  that  the 
man  is  worthier  than  the  baboon — this  is  a  fact  of  infinite  sig- 
nificance.   This  law  of  preference  in  your  hearts  is  the  true 


348 


ARATRA  PENTELIC1. 


essence  of  your  being,  and  the  consciousness  of  that  law  is  a 
more  positive  existence  than  any  dependent  on  the  coherence 
or  forms  of  matter. 

105.  Now,  but  a  few  words  more  of  mythology,  and  I  have 
done.  Remember  that  Athena  holds  the  weaver's  shuttle,  not 
merely  as  an  instrument  of  texture,  but  as  an  instrument  of 
picture  ;  the  ideas  of  clothing,  and  of  the  warmth  of  life,  be- 
ing thus  inseparably  connected  with  those  of  graphic  beauty, 
and  the  brightness  of  life.  I  have  told  you  that  no  art  could 
be  recovered  among  us  without  perf ectness  in  dress,  nor  with- 
out the  elementary  graphic  art  of  women,  in  divers  colours  of 
needlework.  There  has  been  no  nation  of  any  art-energy,  but 
has  strenuously  occupied  and  interested  itself  in  this  house- 
hold picturing,  from  the  web  of  Penelope  to  the  tapestry  of 
Queen  Matilda,  and  the  meshes  of  Arras  and  Gobelins. 

106.  We  should  then  naturally  ask  what  kind  of  embroidery 
Athena  put  on  her  own  robe  ;  "  ttIttXov  iavbv,  ttolklXov,  6v  p  avr^ 
7roLr)(TaTo  /cat,  KOLfxe  xepcriv." 

The  subject  of  that  iroiKiXla  of  hers,  as  you  know,  was  the 
war  of  the  giants  and  gods.  Now  the  real  name  of  these 
giants,  remember,  is  that  used  by  Hesiod,  "  tttjXoxovoi"  "  mud- 
begotten,"  and  the  meaning  of  the  contest  between  these  and 
Zeus,  irrjXoyovuw  iXaTrjp,  is,  again,  the  inspiration  of  life  into 
the  clay,  by  the  goddess  of  breath ;  and  the  actual  confusion 
going  on  visibly  before  you,  daily,  of  the  earth,  heaping  itself 
into  cumbrous  war  with  the  powers  above  it. 

107.  Thus  briefly,  the  entire  material  of  Art,  under  Athena's 
hand,  is  the  contest  of  life  with  clay  ;  and  all  my  task  in  ex- 
plaining to  you  the  early  thought  of  both  the  Athenian  and 
Tuscan  schools  will  only  be  the  tracing  of  this  battle  of  the 
giants  into  its  full  heroic  form,  when,  not  in  tapestry  only — 
but  in  sculpture — and  on  the  portal  of  the  Temple  of  Delphi 
itself,  VOU  have  the  ((  kXovos  iv  revert  Xcllvoictl  ytyai/Twv,"  and 
their  defeat  hailed  by  the  passionate  cry  of  delight  from  the 
Athenian  maids,  beholding  Pallas  in  her  full  power,  "  Xevarw* 
riaAAao'  e[iav  Oeov"  my  own  goddess.  All  our  work,  I  repeat, 
will  be  nothing  but  the  inquiry  into  the  development  of  this 
the  subject,  and  the  pressing  fully  home  the  question  of  Plato 


IMAGINATION. 


349 


about  that  embroidery — "  And  think  you  that  there  is  verily 
war  with  each  other  among  the  Gods  ?  and  dreadful  enmities 
and  battle,  such  as  the  poets  have  told,  and  such  as  our 
painters  set  forth  in  graven  scripture,  to  adorn  all  our  sacred 
rites  and  holy  places  ;  yes,  and  in  the  great  Panathenaea 
themselves,  the  Peplus,  full  of  such  wild  picturing,  is  carried 
up  into  the  Acropolis — shall  we  say  that  these  things  are  true, 
oh  Euthuphron,  right-minded  friend  ?  " 

108.  Yes,  we  say,  and  know,  that  these  things  are  true  ; 
and  true  for  ever  :  battles  of  the  gods,  not  among  themselves, 
but  against  the  earth-giants.  Battle  prevailing  age  by  age,  in 
nobler  life  and  lovelier  imagery  ;  creation,  which  no  theory  of 
mechanism,  no  definition  of  force,  can  explain,  the  adoption 
and  completing  of  individual  form  by  individual  animation, 
breathed  out  of  the  lips  of  the  Father  of  Spirits.  And  to 
recognize  the  presence  in  every  knitted  shape  of  dust,  by 
which  it  lives  and  moves  and  has  its  being — to  recognize  it, 
revere,  and  show  it  forth,  is  to  be  our  eternal  Idolatry. 

"  Thou  shalt  not  bow  down  to  them,  nor  worship  them." 

"  Assuredly  no,"  we  answered  once,  in  our  pride  ;  and 
through  porch  and  aisle,  broke  dowrn  the  carved  work  thereof, 
with  axes  and  hammers. 

Who  would  have  thought  the  day  so  near  when  we  should 
bow  down  to  worship,  not  the  creatures,  but  their  atoms, — 
not  the  forces  that  form,  but  those  that  dissolve  them  ?  Trust 
me,  gentlemen,  the  command  wrhich  is  stringent  against  ado- 
ration of  brutality,  is  stringent  no  less  against  adoration  of 
chaos,  nor  is  faith  in  an  image  fallen  from  heaven  to  be  re- 
formed by  a  faith  only  in  the  phenomenon  of  decadence.  We 
have  ceased  from  the  making  of  monsters  to  be  appeased  by 
sacrifice  ; — it  is  well, — if  indeed  we  have  also  ceased  from 
making  them  in  our  thoughts.  We  have  learned  to  distrust 
the  adorning  of  fair  phantasms,  to  which  we  once  sought  for 
succour  ; — it  is  wrell,  if  we  learn  to  distrust  also  the  adorning  of 
those  to  wThich  we  seek,  for  temptation  ;  but  the  verity  of  gains 
like  these  can  only  be  known  by  our  confession  of  the  divine 
seal  of  strength  and  beauty  upon  the  tempered  frame,  and 
honour  in  the  fervent  heart,  by  which,  merea.sing  visibly,  may 


350 


ARATRA  RENTE LIC I. 


yet  be  manifested  to  us  the  holy  presence,  and  the  approving 
love,  of  the  Loving  God,  who  visits  the  iniquities  of  the 
Fathers  upon  the  Children,  unto  the  third  and  fourth  genera- 
tion of  them  that  hate  Him,  and  shows  mercy  unto  thousands 
in  them  that  love  Him,  and  keep  His  Commandments. 


LECTURE  IV. 

LIKENESS. 

November,  1870. 

109.  You  were  probably  vexed,  and  tired,  towards  the  close  of 
my  last  lecture,  by  the  time  it  took  us  to  arrive  at  the  appar- 
ently simple  conclusion,  that  sculpture  must  only  represent 
organic  form,  and  the  strength  of  life  in  its  contest  with  mat- 
ter. But  it  is  no  small  thing  to  have  that  "  AcuWa)  IlaAAaSa  * 
fixed  in  your  minds,  as  the  one  necessary  sign  by  which  you 
are  to  recognize  right  sculpture,  and  believe  me  you  will  find 
it  the  best  of  all  things,  if  you  can  take  for  yourselves  the  say- 
ing from  the  lips  of  the  Athenian  maids,  in  its  entirety,  and 
say  also — Xevo-ao)  TTaAAaS'  ifiav  Oeav.  I  proceed  to-day  into 
the  practical  appliance  of  this  apparently  speculative,  but  in 
reality  imperative,  law. 

110.  You  observe,  I  have  hitherto  spoken  of  the  power  of 
Athena,  as  over  painting  no  less  than  sculpture.  Bat  her  rule 
over  both  arts  is  only  so  far  as  they  are  zoographic  ; — repre- 
sentative, that  is  to  say,  of  animal  life,  or  of  such  order  and 
discipline  among  other  elements,  as  may  invigorate  and  purify 
it.  Now  there  is  a  speciality  of  the  art  of  painting  beyond 
this,  namely,  the  representation  of  phenomena  of  colour  and 
shadow,  as  such,  without  question  of  the  nature  of  the  things 
that  receive  them.  I  am  now  accordingly  obliged  to  speak  of 
sculpture  and  painting  as  distinct  arts,  but  the  laws  which 
bind  sculpture,  bind  no  less  the  painting  of  the  higher  schools 
which  has,  for  its  main  purpose,  the  showing  beauty  in  human 
or  animal  form  ;  and  which  is  therefore  placed  by  the  Greeks 


LIKENESS. 


051 


equally  under  the  rule  of  Athena,  as  the  Spirit,  first,  of  Life, 
and  then  of  Wisdom  in  conduct. 

111.  First,  I  say,  you  are  to  "see  Pallas  "  in  all  such  work, 
as  the  Queen  of  Life  ;  and  the  practical  law  which  follows 
from  this,  is  one  of  enormous  range  and  importance,  namely, 
that  nothing  must  be  represented  by  sculpture,  external  to 
any  living  form,  which  does  not  help  to  enforce  or  illustrate 
the  conception  of  life.  Both  dress  and  armour  may  be  made 
to  do  this,  by  great  sculptors,  and  are  continually  so  used  by 
the  greatest.  One  of  the  essential  distinctions  between  the 
Athenian  and  Florentine  schools  is  dependent  on  their  treat- 
ment of  drapery  in  this  respect  ;  an  Athenian  always  sets  it  to 
exhibit  the  action  of  the  body,  by  flowing  with  it,  or  over  it, 
or  from  it,  so  as  to  illustrate  both  its  form  and  gesture  ;  a 
Florentine,  on  the  contrary,  always  uses  his  drapery  to  con- 
ceal or  disguise  the  forms  of  the  body,  and  exhibit  mental 
emotion :  but  both  use  it  to  enhance  the  life,  either  of  the 
body  or  soul  ;  Donatello  and  Michael  Angelo,  no  less  than  the 
sculptors  of  Gothic  chivalry,  ennoble  armour  in  the  same  way  ; 
but  base  sculptors  carve  drapery  and  armour  for  the  sake  of 
their  folds  and  picturesqueness  only,  and  forget  the  body  be- 
neath. The  rule  is  so  stern  that  all  delight  in  mere  incidental 
beauty,  which  painting  often  triumphs  in,  is  wholly  forbidden 
to  sculpture  ; — for  instance,  in  painting  the  branch  of  a  tree, 
you  may  rightly  represent  and  enjoy  the  lichens  and  moss  on 
it,  but  a  sculptor  must  not  touch  one  of  them  :  they  are  ines- 
sential to  the  tree's  life, — he  must  give  the  flow  and  bending 
of  the  branch  only,  else  he  does  not  enough  "see  Pallas" 
in  it. 

Or  to  take  a  higher  instance,  here  is  an  exquisite  little 
painted  poem,  by  Edward  Frere  ;  a  cottage  interior,  one  of 
the  thousands  which  within  the  last  two  months  *  have  been 
laid  desolate  in  unhappy  France.  Every  accessory  in  the 
painting  is  of  value — the  fire-side,  the  tiled  floor,  the  vegetables 
lying  upon  it,  and  the  basket  hanging  from  the  roof.  But 
not  one  of  these  accessories  would  have  been  admissible 

*  See  date  of  delivery  of  Lecture.  The  picture  was  of  a  peasant  girl 
of  eleven  or  twelve  years  old,  peeling  carrots  by  a  cottage  fire. 


352 


ABA  TEA  PENTELICL 


in  sculpture.  You  must  carve  nothing  but  what  has  life. 
"Why"?  you  probably  feel  instantly  inclined  to  ask  me. — 
You  see  the  principle  we  have  got,  instead  of  being  blunt  or 
useless,  is  such  an  edged  tool  that  you  are  startled  the  moment 
I  apply  it.  "  Must  we  refuse  every  pleasant  accessory  and 
picturesque  detail,  and  petrify  nothing  but  living  creatures  "  ? 
— Even  so  :  I  would  not  assert  it  on  my  own  authority.  It  is 
the  Greeks  who  say  it,  but  whatever  they  say  of  sculpture,  be 
assured,  is  true. 

112.  That  then  is  the  first  law — you  must  see  Pallas  as  the 
Lady  of  Life — the  second  is,  you  must  see  her  as  the  Lady  of 
Wisdom  ;  or  ao^ia — and  this  is  the  chief  matter  of  all.  I  can- 
not but  think,  that  after  the  considerations  into  which  we 
have  now  entered,  you  will  find  more  interest  than  hitherto 
in  comparing  the  statements  of  Aristotle,  in  the  Ethics,  with 
those  of  Plato  in  the  Polity,  which  are  authoritative  as  Greek 
definitions  of  goodness  in  art,  and  which  you  may  safely  hold 
authoritative  as  constant  definitions  of  it.  You  remember, 
doubtless,  that  the  o-ockia,  or  aperrj  rlyyri%  for  the  sake  of  which 
Phidias  is  called  cro<£os  as  a  sculptor,  and  Polyclitus  as  an 
image-maker,  Eth.  6.  7.  (the  opposition  is  both  between  ideal 
and  portrait  sculpture,  and  between  working  in  stone  and 
bronze)  consists  in  the  "  vovs  tuv  T/./xto)rarwi/  ry  </)i'<ret?"  "the 
mental  apprehension  of  the  things  that  are  most  honourable 
in  their  nature."  Therefore  what  is,  indeed,  most  lovely,  the 
true  image-maker  will  most  love  ;  and  what  is  most  hate- 
ful, he  will  most  hate,  and  in  all  things  discern  the  best  and 
strongest  part  of  them,  and  represent  that  essentially,  or,  if 
the  opposite  of  that,  then  with  manifest  detestation  and  horror. 
That  is  his  art  wisdom  ;  the  knowledge  of  good  and  evil,  and 
the  love  of  good,  so  that  you  may  discern,  even  in  his  repre- 
sentation of  the  vilest  thing,  his  acknowledgment  of  what  re- 
demption i3  possible  for  it,  or  latent  power  exists  in  it ;  and, 
contrariwise,  his  sense  of  its  present  misery.  But  for  the  most 
part,  he  will  idolize,  and  force  us  also  to  idolize,  whatever  is 
living,  and  virtuous,  and  victoriously  right ;  opposing  to  it 
in  some  definite  mode  the  image  of  the  conquered  cpTreroV. 

113.  This  is  generally  true  of  both  the  great  arts  ;  but  in 


LIKENESS. 


353 


severity  and  precision,  true  of  sculpture.  To  return  to  our 
illustration  :  this  poor  little  girl  was  more  interesting  to  Ed- 
ward Frere,  he  being  a  painter,  because  she  was  poorly  dressed, 
and  wore  these  clumsy  shoes,  and  old  red  cap,  and  patched 
gown.  May  we  sculpture  her  so  ?  No.  We  may  sculpture 
her  naked,  if  we  like  ;  but  not  in  rags. 

But  if  we  may  not  put  her  into  marble  in  rags,  may  we  give 
her  a  pretty  frock  with  ribands  and  flounces  to  it,  and  put 
her  into  marble  in  that  ?  No.  We  may  put  her  simplest 
peasant's  dress,  so  it  be  perfect  and  orderly,  into  marble  ;  any- 
thing finer  than  that  would  be  more  dishonourable  in  the  eyes 
of  Athena  than  rags.  If  she  were  a  French  princess,  you 
might  carve  her  embroidered  robe  and  diadem  ;  if  she  were 
Joan  of  Arc  you  might  carve  her  armour — for  then  these  also 
would  be  "  tCov  TifjLUDTa.Twv,'''  not  otherwise. 

114.  Is  not  this  an  edge-tool  we  have  got  hold  of,  unawares  ? 
and  a  subtle  one  too  ;  so  delicate  and  scimitar-like  in  decision. 
For  note,  that  even  Joan  of  Arc's  armour  must  be  only  sculpt- 
ured, if  she  has  it  on  ;  it  is  not  the  honourableness  or  beauty 
of  it  that  are  enough,  but  the  direct  bearing  of  it  by  her  body. 
You  might  be  deeply,  even  pathetically,  interested  by  looking 
at  a  good  knight's  dinted  coat  of  mail,  left  in  his  desolate  hall. 
May  you  sculpture  it  where  it  hangs  ?  No  ;  the  helmet  for 
his  pillow,  if  you  will — no  more. 

You  see  we  did  not  do  our  dull  work  for  nothing  in  last 
lecture.  I  define  what  we  have  gained  once  more,  and  then 
we  will  enter  on  our  new  ground. 

115.  The  proper  subject  of  sculpture,  we  have  determined, 
is  the  spiritual  power  seen  in  the  form  of  any  living  thing, 
and  so  represented  as  to  give  evidence  that  the  sculptor  has 
loved  the  good  of  it  and  hated  the  evil. 

(i  So  represented,"  we  sa}^  ;  but  how  is  that  to  be  done  ? 
Why  should  it  not  be  represented,  if  possible,  just  as  it  is 
seen  ?  What  mode  or  limit  of  representation  may  we  adopt  V 
We  are  to  carve  things  that  have  life  ; — shall  we  try  so  to  imi- 
tate them  that  they  may  indeed  seem  living, — or  only  half 
living,  and  like  stone  instead  of  flesh  ? 

It  will  simplify  this  question  if  I  show  you  three  examples 


ARATRA  VENT  ELI  CI. 


of  what  the  Greeks  actually  did :  three  typical  pieces  of  their 
sculpture,  in  order  of  perfection. 

116.  And  now,  observe  that  in  all  our  historical  work,  I  will 
endeavour  to  do,  myself,  what  I  have  asked  you  to  do  in  your 
drawing  exercises  ;  namely,  to  outline  firmly  in  the  beginning, 
and  then  fill  in  the  detail  more  minutely.  I  will  give  you 
first,  therefore,  in  a  symmetrical  form,  absolutely  simple  and 
easily  remembered,  the  large  chronology  of  the  Greek  school ; 
within  that  unforgettable  scheme  we  will  place,  as  we  discover 
them,  the  minor  relations  of  arts  and  times. 

I  number  the  nine  centuries  before  Christ  thus,  upwards, 
and  divide  them  into  three  groups  of  three  each. 


A.  archaic.     \  8 
7 


6 


B.  BEST. 


4 


C.   CORRUPT.       •{  2 

1 

v. 

Then  the  ninth,  eighth,  and  seventh  centuries  are  the  period 
of  Archaic  Greek  Art,  steadily  progressive  wherever  it  existed. 

The  sixth,  fifth,  and  fourth  are  the  period  of  central  Greek 
Art ;  the  fifth,  or  central  century  producing  the  finest.  That 
is  easily  recollected  by  the  battle  of  Marathon.  And  the  third, 
second,  and  first  centuries  are  the  period  of  steady  decline. 

Learn  this  ABC  thoroughly,  and  mark,  for  yourselves, 
what  you,  at  present,  think  the  vital  events  in  each  century. 
As  you  know  more,  you  will  think  other  events  the  vital  ones  ; 
but  the  best  historical  knowledge  only  approximates  to  true 


Plate  VII  — Archaic,  Central  and  Declining  Art 
of  Greece. 


LIKENESS. 


thought  in  that  matter  ;  only  be  sure  that  what  is  truly  vital 
in  the  character  which  governs  events,  is  always  expressed  by 
the  art  of  the  century  ;  so  that  if  you  could  interpret  that  art 
rightly,  the  better  part  of  your  task  in  reading  history  would 
be  done  to  your  hand. 

117.  It  is  generally  impossible  to  date  with  precision  art  of 
the  archaic  period — often  difficult  to  date  even  that  of  the 
central  three  hundred  years.  I  will  not  weary  you  with  futile 
minor  divisions  of  time;  here  are  three  coins  (Plate  VII.) 
roughly,  but  decisively,  characteristic  of  the  three  ages.  The 
first  is  an  early  coin  of  Tarentum.  The  city  was  founded  as 
you  know,  by  the  Spartan  Phalanthus,  late  in  the  eighth 
century.  I  believe  the  head  is  meant  for  that  of  Apollo 
Archegetes,  it  ftiay  however  be  Taras,  the  son  of  Poseidon  ;  it 
is  no  matter  to  us  at  present  whom  it  is  meant  for,  but  the 
fact  that  we  cannot  know,  is  itself  of  the  greatest  import.  We 
cannot  say,  with  any  certainty,  unless  by  discovery  of  some 
collateral  evidence,  whether  this  head  is  intended  for  that  of 
a  god,  or  demi-god,  or  a  mortal  warrior.  Ought  not  that  to 
disturb  some  of  your  thoughts  respecting  Greek  idealism? 
Farther,  if  by  investigation  we  discover  that  the  head  is  meant 
for  that  of  Phalanthus,  we  shall  know  nothing  of  the  charac- 
ter of  Phalanthus  from  the  face  ;  for  there  is  no  portraiture 
at  this  early  time. 

118.  The  second  coin  is  of  iEnus  in  Macedonia  ;  probably 
of  the  fifth  or  early  fourth  century,  and  entirely  characteristic 
of  the  central  period.  This  we  know  to  represent  the  face  of 
a  god — Hermes.  The  third  coin  is  a  king's,  not  a  city's.  I 
will  not  tell  you,  at  this  moment,  what  king's ;  but  only  that 
it  is  a  late  coin  of  the  third  period,  and  that  it  is  as  distinct 
in  purpose  as  the  coin  of  Tarentum  is  obscure.  Yvre  know  of 
this  coin,  that  it  represents  no  god  nor  demi-god,  but  a  mere 
mortal ;  and  we  know  precisely,  from  the  portrait,  what  that 
mortal's  face  was  like. 

119.  A  glance  at  the  three  coins,  as  they  are  set  side  by 
side,  will  now  show  you  the  main  differences  in  the  three  great 
Greek  styles.  The  archaic  coin  is  sharp  and  hard  ;  every  line 
decisive  and  numbered,  set  unhesitatingly  in  its  place  ;  nothing 


356 


AEATRA  PENTELICL 


is  wrong,  though  everything  incomplete,  and,  to  us  who  have 
seen  finer  art,  ugly.  The  central  coin  is  as  decisive  and  clear 
in  arrangement  of  masses,  but  its  contours  are  completely 
rounded  and  finished.  There  is  no  character  in  its  execution 
so  prominent  that  you  can  give  an  epithet  to  the  style.  It  in 
not  hard,  it  is  not  soft,  it  is  not  delicate,  it  is  not  coarse,  it  is 
not  grotesque,  it  is  not  beautiful ;  and  I  am  convinced,  unless 
you  had  been  told  that  this  is  fine  central  Greek  art,  you 
would  have  seen  nothing  at  all  in  it  to  interest  you.  Do  noh 
let  yourselves  be  anywise  forced  into  admiring  it ;  there  is, 
indeed,  nothing  more  here,  than  an  approximately  true  ren- 
dering of  a  healthy  youthful  face,  without  the  slightest  attempt 
to  give  an  expression  of  activity,  cunning,  nobility,  or  any 
other  attribute  of  the  Mercurial  mind.  Extreme  simplicity, 
unpretending  vigour  of  work,  which  claims  no  admiration 
either  for  minuteness  or  dexterity,  and  suggests  no  idea  of 
effort  at  all ;  refusal  of  extraneous  ornament,  and  perfectly 
arranged  disposition  of  counted  masses  in  a  sequent  order, 
whether  in  the  beads,  or  the  ringlets  of  hair  ;  this  is  all  you 
have  to  be  pleased  with  ;  neither  will  you  ever  find,  in  the 
best  Greek  Art,  more.  You  might  at  first  suppose  that  the 
chain  of  beads  round  the  cap  was  an  extraneous  ornament ; 
but  I  have  little  doubt  that  it  is  as  definitely  the  proper  fillet 
for  the  head  of  Hermes,  as  the  olive  for  Zeus,  or  corn  for 
Triptolemus.  The  cap  or  petasus  cannot  have  expanded  edges, 
there  is  no  room  for  them  on  the  coin  ;  these  must  be  under- 
stood, therefore  ;  but  the  nature  of  the  cloud-petasus  is  ex- 
plained by  edging  it  with  beads,  representing  either  dew  or 
hail.  The  shield  of  Athena  often  bears  white  pellets  for  hail, 
in  like  manner. 

120.  The  third  coin  will,  I  think,  at  once  strike  you  by 
what  we  moderns  should  call  its  "  vigour  of  character/" 
You  may  observe  also  that  the  features  are  finished  with 
great  care  and  subtlety,  but  at  the  cost  of  simplicity  and 
breadth.  But  the  essential  difference  between  it  and  the 
central  art,  is  its  disorder  in  design — you  see  the  locks  of  hair 
cannot  be  counted  any  longer — they  are  entirely  dishevelled 
and  irregular.    Nov/  the  individual  character  may,  or  may  not 


LIKENESS. 


357 


be,  a  sign  of  decline  ;  but  the  licentiousness,  the  casting  loose 
of  the  masses  in  the  design,  is  an  infallible  one.  The  effort 
at  portraiture  is  good  for  art  if  the  men  to  be  portrayed  are 
good  men,  not  otherwise.  In  the  instance  before  you,  the 
head  is  that  of  Mithriclates  VI.  of  Pontus,  who  had,  indeed, 
the  good  qualities  of  being  a  linguist  and  a  patron  of  the  arts  ; 
but  as  you  will  remember,  murdered,  according  to  report,  his 
mother,  certainly  his  brother,  certainly  his  wives  and  sisters, 
I  have  not  counted  how  many  of  his  children,  and  from  a  hun- 
dred to  a  hundred  and  fifty  thousand  person?  besides  ;  these 
last  in  a  single  day's  massacre.  The  effort  to  represent  this 
kind  of  person  is  not  by  any  means  a  method  of  study  from 
life  ultimately  beneficial  to  art. 

121.  This  however  is  not  the  point  I  have  to  urge  to-day. 
What  I  want  you  to  observe  is  that,  though  the  master  of  the 
great  time  does  not  attempt  portraiture,  he  does  attempt  ani- 
mation. And  as  far  as  his  means  will  admit,  he  succeeds  in 
making  the  face — you  might  almost  think — vulgarly  animated  ; 
as  like  a  real  face,  literally,  "as  it  can  stare."  Yes:  and  its 
sculptor  meant  it  to  be  so  ;  and  that  was  what  Phidias  meant 
his  Jupiter  to  be,  if  he  could  manage  it  Not,  indeed,  to  be 
taken  for  Zeus  himself ;  and  yet,  to  be  as  like  a  living  Zeus  as 
art  could  make  it.  Perhaps  you  think  he  tried  to  make  it  look 
living  only  for  the  sake  of  the  mob,  and  would  not  have  tried 
to  do  so  for  connoisseurs.  Pardon  me  ;  for  real  connoisseurs, 
he  would,  and  did  ;  and  herein  consists  a  truth  which  belongs 
to  all  the  arts,  and  which  I  will  at  once  drive  home  in  your 
minds,  as  firmly  as  I  can. 

122.  All  second-rate  artists — (and  remember,  the  second- 
rate  ones  are  a  loquacious  multitude,  while  the  great  come 
only  one  or  two  in  a  century  ;  and  then,  silently) — all  second- 
rate  artists  will  tell  you  that  the  object  of  fine  art  is  not  re- 
semblance, but  some  kind  of  abstraction  more  refined  than 
reality.  Put  that  out  of  your  heads  at  once.  The  object  of 
the  great  Resemblant  Arts  is,  and  always  has  been,  to  resemble; 
and  to  resemble  as  closely  as  possible.  It  is  the  function  of  a 
good  portrait  to  set  the  man  before  you  in  habit  as  he  lived, 
and  I  would  we  had  a  few  more  that  did  so.  It  is  the  function 


358 


A  R ATM  A  PENT  ELI  CI. 


of  a  good  landscape  to  set  the  scene  before  you  in  its  reality ; 
to  make  you,  if  it  may  be,  think  the  clouds  are  flying,  and 
the  streams  foaming.  It  is  the  function  of  the  best  sculptor 
—the  true  Daedalus — to  make  stillness  look  like  breathing, 
and  marble  look  like  flesh. 

123.  And  in  all  great  times  of  art,  this  purpose  is  as  naively 
expressed  as  it  is  steadily  held.  All  the  talk  about  abstraction 
belongs  to  periods  of  decadence.  In  living  times,  people  see 
something  living  that  pleases  them  ;  and  they  try  to  make  it 
live  for  ever,  or  to  make  it  something  as  like  it  as  possible,  that 
will  last  for  ever.  They  paint  their  statues,  and  inlay  the  eyes 
with  jewels,  and  set  real  crowns  on  their  heads  ;  they  finish, 
in  their  pictures,  every  thread  of  embroiderv,  and  would  fain, 
if  they  could,  draw  every  leaf  upon  the  trees.  And  their  only 
verbal  expression  of  conscious  success  is,  that  they  have  made 
their  work  "look  real." 

124.  You  think  all  that  very  wrong.  So  did  I,  once  ;  but 
it  was  I  that  was  wrong.  A  long  time  ago,  before  ever  I  had 
seen  Oxford,  I  painted  a  picture  of  the  Lake  of  Como,  for  my 
father.  It  was  not  at  all  like  the  Lake  of  Como;  but  I  thought 
it  rather  the  better  for  that.  My  father  differed  with  me  ;  and 
objected  particularly  to  a  boat  with  a  red  and  yellow  awning, 
which  I  had  put  into  the  most  conspicuous  corner  of  my  draw- 
ing. I  declared  this  boat  to  be  "necessary  to  the  composi- 
tion. "  My  father  not  the  less  objected,  that  he  had  never  seen 
such  a  boat,,  either  at  Como  or  elsewhere  ;  and  suggested  that 
if  I  would  make  the  lake  look  a  little  more  like  water,  I  should 
be  under  no  necessity  of  explaining  its  nature  by  the  presence 
of  floating  objects.  I  thought  him  at  the  time  a  very  simple 
person  for  his  pains  ;  but  have  since  learned,  and  it  is  the  very 
gist  of  all  practical  matters,  which,  as  professor  of  fine  art,  I 
have  now  to  tell  you,  that  the  great  point  in  painting  a  lake  is 
— to  get  it  to  look  like  water. 

125.  So  far3  so  good.  We  lay  it  down  for  a  first  principle, 
that  our  graphic  art,  whether  painting  or  sculpture,  is  to  pro- 
duce something  which  shall  look  as  like  Nature  as  possible. 
But  now  we  must  go  one  step  farther,  and  say  that  it  is  to 
produce  what  shall  look  like  Nature  to  people  who  know  what 


LIKENESS. 


359 


Nature  is  like  !  You  see  this  is  at  once  a  great  restriction,  as 
well  as  a  great  exaltation  of  our  aim.  Our  business  is  not  to 
deceive  the  simple  ;  but  to  deceive  the  wise  !  Here,  for  in- 
stance, is  a  modern  Italian  print,  representing,  to  the  best  of 
its  power,  St.  Cecilia,  in  a  brilliantly  realistic  manner.  And 
the  fault  of  the  work  is  not  in  its  earnest  endeavour  to  show 
St.  Cecilia  in  habit  as  she  lived,  but  in  that  the  effort  could 
only  be  successful  with  persons  unaware  of  the  habit  St,  Ce- 
cilia lived  in.  And  this  condition  of  appeal  only  to  the  wise 
increases  the  difficulty  of  imitative  resemblance  so  greatly, 
that,  with  only  average  skill  or  materials,  we  must  surrender 
all  hope  of  it,  and  be  content  with  an  imperfect  representa- 
tion, true  as  far  as  it  reaches,  and  such  as  to  excite  the  imagi- 
nation of  a  wise  beholder  to  complete  it ;  though  falling  very 
far  short  of  what  either  he  or  we  should  otherwise  have  de- 
sired. For  instance,  here  is  a  suggestion,  by  Sir  Joshua  Rey- 
nolds, of  the  general  appearance  of  a  British  Judge — requir- 
ing the  imagination  of  a  very  wise  beholder  indeed,  to  fill  it 
up,  or  even  at  first  to  discover  what  it  is  meant  for.  Never- 
theless, it  is  better  art  than  the  Italian  St.  Cecilia,  because  the 
artist,  however  little  he  may  have  done  to  represent  his  knowl- 
edge, does,  indeed,  know  altogether  what  a  Judge  is  like,  and 
appeals  only  to  the  criticism  of  those  who  know  also. 

126.  There  must  be,  therefore,  two  degrees  of  truth  to  be 
looked  for  in  the  good  graphic  arts  ;  one,  the  commonest, 
which,  by  any  partial  or  imperfect  sign  conveys  to  you  an  idea 
which  you  must  complete  for  yourself  ;  and  the  other,  the 
finest,  a  representation  so  perfect  as  to  leave  you  nothing  to 
be  farther  accomplished  by  this  independent  exertion  ;  but  to 
give  you  the  same  feeling  of  possession  and  presence  which 
you  would  experience  from  the  natural  object  itself.  For  in- 
stance of  the  first,  in  this  representation  of  a  rainbow,*  the 
artist  has  no  hope  that,  by  the  black  lines  of  engraving,  he  can 
deceive  you  into  any  belief  of  the  rainbow's  being  there,  but 
he  gives  indication  enough  of  what  he  intends,  to  enable  you 
to  supply  the  rest  of  the  idea  yourself,  providing  always  you 
know  beforehand  what  a  rainbow  is  like.  But  in  this  drawing 
*  In  Durer's  "  Melencholia." 


AM  A  TEA  PENTELICL 


of  the  falls  of  Terni,*  the  painter  has  strained  his  skill  to  the 
utmost  to  give  an  actually  deceptive  resemblance  of  the  iris, 
dawning  and  fading  among  the  foam.  So  far  as  he  has  not 
actually  deceived  you,  it  is  not  because  he  would  not  have 
done  so  if  he  could ;  but  only  because  his  colours  and  science 
have  fallen  short  of  his  desire.  .They  have  fallen  so  little  short 
that,  in  a  good  light,  you  may  all  but  believe  the  foam  and 
the  sunshine  are  drifting  and  changing  among  the  rocks. 

127.  And  after  looking  a  little  while,  you  will  begin  to  re- 
gret that  they  are  not  so  :  you  will  feel  that,  lovely  as  the 
drawing  is,  you  would  like  far  better  to  see  the  real  place,  and 
the  goats  skipping  among  the  rocks,  and  the  spray  floating 
above  the  fall.  And  this  is  the  true  sign  of  the  greatest  art 
—to  part  voluntarily  with  its  greatness; — to  make  itself 'poor 
and  unnoticed  ;  but  so  to  exalt  and  set  forth  its  theme  that 
you  may  be  fain  to  see  the  theme  instead  of  it.  So  that  you 
have  never  enough  admired  a  great  workman's  doing  till  you 
have  begun  to  despise  it.  The  best  homage  that  could  be  paid 
to  the  Athena  of  Phidias  would  be  to  desire  rather  to  see  the 
living  goddess  ;  and  the  loveliest  Madonnas  of  Christian  art 
fall  short  of  their  due  power,  if  they  do  not  make  their  be- 
holders sick  at  heart  to  see  the  living  Virgin. 

128.  We  have  then,  for  our  requirement  of  the  finest  art 
(sculpture,  or  anything  else),  that  it  shall  be  so  like  the 
thing  it  represents  as  to  please  those  who  best  know  or  can 
conceive  the  original ;  and,  if  possible,  please  them  decep- 
tively— its  final  triumph  being  to  deceive  even  the  wise ; 
and  (the  Greeks  thought)  to  please  even  the  Immortals,  who 
were  so  wise  PlS  to  be  undeceivable.  So  that  you  get  the 
Greek,  thus  far  entirely  true,  idea  of  perfectness  in  sculpture, 
expressed  to  you  by  what  Phalaris  says,  at  first  sight  of  the 
bull  of  Perilaus,  "It  only  wanted  motion  and  bellowing  to 
seem  alive  ;  and  as  soon  as  I  saw  it,  I  cried  out,  it  ought  to 
be  sent  to  the  god."  To  Apollo,  for  only  he,  the  undeceiv- 
able, could  thoroughly  understand  such  sculpture,  and  per- 
fectly delight  in  it. 

129.  And  with  this  expression  of  the  Greek  ideal  of  sculpt- 

*  Turner's,  in  the  Hakewill  series. 


LIKENESS. 


nre,  I  wish  you  to  join  the  early  Italian,  summed  in  a  single  line 
by  Dante — "non  vide  me'  di  me,  chi  vide  '1  vero."  Read  the 
12th  canto  of  the  "Purgatory,"  and  learn  that  whole  passage 
by  heart ;  and  if  ever  you  chance  to  go  to  Pis  to  j  a,  look  at 
La  Bobbia's  coloured  porcelain  bas-reliefs  of  the  seven  works 
of  Mercy  on  the  front  of  the  hospital  there  ;  and  note  es- 
pecially the  faces  of  the  two  sick  men — one  at  the  point  of 
death,  and  the  other  in  the  first  peace  and  long-drawn  breath- 
ing of  health  after  fever — and  you  will  know  what  Dante 
meant  by  the  preceding  line,  "Morti  li  morti,  e  i  vivi  paren 
vivi." 

180.  But  now,  may  we  not  ask  farther, — is  it  impossible 
for  art  such  as  this,  prepared  for  the  wise,  to  please  the 
simple  also  ?  Without  entering  on  the  awkward  questions 
of  degree,  how  many  the  wise  can  be,  or  how  much  men 
should  know,  in  order  to  be  rightly  called  wise,  may  we  not 
conceive  an  art  to  be  possible,  which  would  deceive  every- 
body,  or  everybody  worth  deceiving  ?  I  showed  you  at  my 
first  lecture,  a  little  ringlet  of  Japan  ivory,  as  a  type  of  ele- 
mentary bas-relief  touched  with  colour  ;  and  in  your  rudi- 
mentary series  you  have  a  drawing  by  Mr.  Burgess,  of  one  of 
the  little  fishes  enlarged,  with  every  touch  of  the  chisel  fac- 
similed on  the  more  visible  scale  ;  and  showing  the  little 
black  bead  inlaid  for  the  eye,  which  in  the  original  is  hardly 
to  be  seen  without  a  lens.  You  may,  perhaps  be  surprised, 
when  I  tell  you,  that  (putting  the  question  of  subject  aside 
for  the  moment,  and  speaking  only  of  the  mode  of  execution 
and  aim  at  resemblance),  you  have  there  a  perfect  example  of 
the  Greek  ideal  of  method  in  sculpture.  And  you  will 
admit  that,  to  the  simplest  person  whom  wre  could  introduce 
as  a  critic,  that  fish  would  be  a  satisfactory,  nay,  almost  a 
deceptive  fish  ;  while  to  any  one  caring  for  subtleties  of  art,  I 
need  not  point  out  that  every  touch  of  the  chisel  is  applied 
with  consummate  knowledge,  and  that  it  would  be  impossible 
to  convey  more  truth  and  life  with  the  given  quantity  of 
workmanship. 

131.  Here  is,  indeed,  a  drawing  by  Turner,  (Edu.  131), 
in  which  with  some  fifty  times  the  quantity  of  labour,  and 


3G2 


ARATMA  PENTEL1GL 


far  more  highly  educated  faculty  of  sight,  the  artist  hag 
expressed  some  qualities  of  lustre  and  colour  which  only 
very  wise  persons  indeed  could  perceive  in  a  John  Dory ; 
and  this  piece  of  paper  contains,  therefore,  much  more,  and 
more  subtle,  art,  than  the  Japan  ivory ;  but  are  we  sure  that 
it  is  therefore  greater  art?  or  that  the  painter  was  better 


Fig.  7. 


employed  in  producing  this  drawing,  wrhich  only  one  person 
can  possess,  and  only  one  in  a  hundred  enjoy,  than  he  would 
have  been  in  producing  two  or  three  pieces  on  a  larger  scale, 
wThich  should  have  been  at  once  accessible  to,  and  enjoyable 
by,  a  number  of  simpler  persons?  Suppose  for  instance, 
that  Turner,  instead  of  faintly  touching  this  outline,  on  white 
paper,  with  his  camel's  hair  pencil,  had  struck  the  main  forms 
of  his  fish  into  marble,  thus  (Fig.  7) :  and  instead  of  colouring 
the  white  paper  so  delicately  that,  perhaps,  only  a  few  of  the 
most  keenly  observant  artists  in  England  can  see  it  at  all,  had, 


LIKENESS. 


3G3 


with  Lis  strong  hand,  tinted  the  marble  with  a  few  colours, 
deceptive  to  the  people,  and  harmonious  to  the  initiated  ; 
suppose  that  he  had  even  conceded  so  much  to  the  spirit  of 
popular  applause  as  to  allow  of  a  bright  glass  bead  being  inlaid 
for  the  eye,  in  the  Japanese  manner  ;  and  that  the  enlarged, 
deceptive,  and  popularly  pleasing  work  had  been  carved  on 
the  outside  of  a  great  building, — say  Fishmongers'  Hall, — 
wrhere  everybody  commercially  connected  with  Billingsgate 
could  have  seen  it,  and  ratified  it  with  the  wisdom  of  the 
market ; — might  not  the  art  have  been  greater,  worthier,  and 
kinder  in  such  use  ? 

132.  Perhaps  the  idea  does  not  once  approve  itself  to  you 
of  having  your  public  buildings  covered  with  ornaments  like 
this  ;  but  pray,  remember  that  the  choice  of  subject  is  an  ethi- 
cal question,  not  now  before  us.  All  I  ask  you  to  decide  is 
whether  the  method  is  right,  and  would  be  pleasant  in  giving 
the  distinctiveness  to  pretty  things,  which  it  has  here  given 
to  what,  I  suppose  it  may  be  assumed,  you  feel  to  be  an  ugly 
thing.  Of  course,  I  must  note  parenthetically,  such  realistic 
work  is  impossible  in  a  country  where  the  buildings  are  to  be 
discoloured  by  coal-smoke  ;  but  so  is  all  fine  sculpture,  whatso- 
ever ;  and  the  whiter,  the  worse  its  chance.  For  that  which 
is  prepared  for  private  persons,  to  be  kept  under  cover,  will, 
of  necessity,  degenerate  into  the  copyism  of  past  work, 
or  merely  sensational  and  sensual  forms  of  present  life,  unless 
there  be  a  governing  school  addressing  the  populace,  for 
their  instruction,  on  the  outside  of  buildings.  So  that,  as  I 
partly  warned  you  in  my  third  lecture,  you  can  simply  have 
no  sculpture  in  a  coal  country.  Whether  you  like  coals  or 
carvings  best,  is  no  business  of  mine.  I  merely  have  to 
assure  you  of  the  fact  that  they  are  incompatible. 

But,  assuming  that  we  are  again,  some  day,  to  become  a 
civilized  and  governing  race,  deputing  ironmongery,  coal- 
digging,  and  lucre-digging,  to  our  slaves  in  other  countries, 
it  is  quite  conceivable  that,  with  an  increasing  knowledge  of 
natural  history,  and  desire  for  such  knowledge,  what  is  now 
done  by  careful,  but  inefficient,  woodcuts,  and  in  ill-coloured 
engravings,  might  be  put  in  quite  permanent  sculptures,  with 


3C4 


ABA  TiiA  PEN  TEL  I  CI. 


inlay  of  variegated  precious  stones,  on  the  outside  of  build- 
ings, where  such  pictures  would  he  little  costly  to  the  peo- 
ple ;  and  in  a  more  popular  manner  still,  by  Eobbia  ware  and 
Palissy  ware,  and  inlaid  majolica,  which  would  differ  from  the 
housewives'  present  favourite  decoration  of  plates  abov$  her 
kitchen  dresser,  by  being  every  piece  of  it  various,  instructive, 
and  universally  visible. 

133.  You  hardly  know,  I  suppose,  whether  I  am  speaking 
in  jest  or  earnest.  In  the  most  solemn  earnest,  I  assure  you  ; 
though  such  is  the  strange  course  of  our  popular  life  that 
all  the  irrational  arts  of  destruction  are  at  once  felt  to  be 
earnest ;  while  any  plan  for  those  of  instruction  on  a  grand 
scale,  sounds  like  a  dream  or  jest.  Still,  I  do  not  absolutely 
propose  to  decorate  our  public  buildings  with  sculpture 
wholly  of  this  character ;  though  beast,  and  fowl,  and  creep- 
ing things,  and  fishes,  might  all  find  room  on  such  a  building 
as  the  Solomon's  House  of  a  New  Atlantis  ;  and  some  of  them 
might  even  become  symbolic  of  much  to  us  again.  Passing 
through  the  Strand,  only  the  other  day,  for  instance,  I  saw 
four  highly  finished  and  delicately  coloured  pictures  of  cock- 
fighting,  which,  for  imitative  quality,  were  nearly  all  that 
could  be  desired,  going  far  beyond  the  Greek  cock  of  Himera ; 
and  they  would  have  delighted  a  Greek's  soul,  if  they  had 
meant  as  much  as  a  Greek  cock-fight  ;  but  they  were  only 
types  of  the  "  eVdo/xa^cK  dAeVrwp,"  and  of  the  spirit  of  home 
contest,  which  has  been  so  fatal  lately  to  the  Bird  of  France  ; 
and  not  of  the  defence  of  one's  own  barnyard,  in  thought  of 
which  the  Olympians  set  the  cock  on  the  pillars  of  their 
chariot  course  ;  and  gave  it  goodly  alliance  in  its  battle,  as 
you  may  see  here,  in  what  is  left  of  the  angle  of  mouldering 
marble  in  the  chair  of  the  priest  of  Dionusos.  The  cast  of  it, 
from  the  centre  of  the  theatre  under  the  Acropolis,  is  in  the 
British  Museum  ;  and  I  wanted  its  spiral  for  you,  and  this 
kneeling  Angel  of  Victory  ; — it  is  late  Greek  art,  but  nobly 
systematic  flat  bas-relief.  So  I  set  Mr.  Burgess  to  draw  it ; 
but  neither  he  nor  I  for  a  little  while,  could  make  out  what 
the  Angel  of  Victory  was  kneeling  for.  His  attitude  is  an 
ancient  and  grandly  conventional  one  among  the  Egyptians; 


LIKENESS. 


365 


and  I  was  tracing  it  back  to  a  kneeling  goddess  of  the  great* 
est  dynasty  of  the  Pharaohs — a  goddess  of  Evening,  or  Death, 
laying  down  the  sun  out  of  her  right  hand  ; — when,  one  bright 
day,  the  shadows  came  out  clear  on  the  Athenian  throne,  and 
I  saw  that  my  Angel  of  Victory  was  only  backing  a  cock  at  a 
cock-fight. 

134  Still,  as  I  have  said,  there  is  no  reason  why  sculpture, 
even  for  simplest  persons,  should  confine  itself  to  imagery  of 
fish,  or  fowl,  or  four-footed  things. 

We  go  back  to  our  first  principle  :  we  ought  to  carve  noth- 
ing but  what  is  honourable.  And  you  are  offended,  at  this 
moment,  with  my  fish,  (as  I  believe,  when  the  first  sculptures 
appeared  on  the  windows  of  this  museum,  offence  was  taken 
at  the  unnecessary  introduction  of  cats),  these  dissatisfactions 
being  properly  felt  by  your  "  vovs  rwy  Ti/xiwraTOH'.''  For  in- 
deed, in  all  cases,  our  right  judgment  must  depend  on  our 
wish  to  give  honour  only  to  things  and  creatures  that  deserve 
it, 

135.  And  now  I  must  state  to  you  another  principle  of 
veracity,  both  in  sculpture,  and  all  following  arts,  of  wider 
scope  than  any  hitherto  examined.  We  have  seen  that  sculpt- 
ure is  to  be  a  true  representation  of  true  external  form. 
Much  more  is  it  to  be  a  representation  of  true  internal  emo- 
tion. You  must  carve  only  what  you  yourself  see  as  you  see 
it;  but,  much  more,  you  must  carve  only  what  you  yourself 
feel,  as  you  feel  it.  You  may  no  more  endeavour  to  feel 
through  other  men's  souls,  than  to  see  with  other  men's  eyes. 
Whereas  generally  now  in  Europe  and  America,  every  man's 
energy  is  bent  upon  acquiring  some  false  emotion,  not  his 
own,  but  belonging  to  the  past,  or  to  other  persons,  because 
he  has  been  taught  that  such  and  such  a  result  of  it  will  be 
fine.  Every  attempted  sentiment  in  relation  to  art  is  hypo- 
critical ;  our  notions  of  sublimity,  of  grace,  or  pious  serenity, 
are  all  second  hand  ;  and  we  are  practically  incapable  of  de- 
signing so  much  as  a  bell-handle  or  a  door-knocker  without 
borrowing  the  first  notion  of  it  from  those  who  are  gone — 
where  we  shall  not  wrake  them  with  our  knocking.  I  would 
we  could. 


DGG  ARATRA  PENTELICL 

136.  In  the  midst  of  this  desolation  we  have  nothing  to 
count  on  for  real  growth,  bat  what  we  can  find  of  honest  lik- 
ing and  longing,  in  ourselves  and  in  others.  "We  must  dis- 
cover, if  we  would  healthily  advance,  what  things  are  verily 
Tt/uwrara  among  us  ;  and  if  we  delight  to  honour  the  dis- 
honourable, consider  how,  in  future,  we  may  better  bestow 
our  likings.  Now  it  appears  to  me  from  all  our  popular 
declarations,  that  we,  at  present,  honour  nothing  so  much  as 
liberty  and  independence  ;  and  no  person  so  much  as  the  Free 
man  and  Self-made  man,  who  will  be  ruled  by  no  one,  and 
has  been  taught,  or  helped,  by  no  one.  And  the  reason  I 
chose  a  fish  for  you  as  the  first  subject  of  sculpture,  was  that 
in  men  who  are  free  and  self-made,  you  have  the  nearest  ap- 
proach, humanly  possible,  to  the  state  of  the  fish,  and  finely- 
organized  ifj-n-tTov.  You  get  the  exact  phrase  in  Habakkuk,  if 
you  take  the  Septuagint  text. — "iroLrjcreis  rovs  av6pu>7rovs  <Ls  tovs 
i^Ova?  rrjs  OaXo.aaqs,  koL  <!)?  tol  €p7T€Ta  tol  ovk  l^orra  7]yovjJL€vov." 

"  Thou  wilt  make  men  as  the  fishes  of  the  sea,  and  as  the 
reptile  things,  that  have  no  ruler  over  them"  And  it  chanced 
that  as  I  was  preparing  this  lecture,  one  of  our  most  able  and 
popular  prints  gave  me  a  woodcut  of  the  "  self-made  man/' 
specified  as  such,  so  vigorously  drawn,  and  with  so  few 
touches,  that  Phidias  or  Turner  himself  could  scarcely  have 
done  it  better  ;  so  that  I  had  only  to  ask  my  assistant  to  en- 
large it  with  accuracy,  and  it  became  comparable  with  my 
fish  at  once.  Of  course  it  is  not  given  by  the  caricaturist  as 
an  admirable  face  ;  only,  I  am  enabled  by  his  skill  to  set  be- 
fore you,  without  any  suspicion  of  unfairness  on  my  part,  the 
expression  to  which  the  life  we  profess  to  think  most  honour- 
able, naturally  leads.  If  wre  were  to  take  the  hat  off,  you  see 
how  nearly  the  profile  corresponds  with  that  of  the  typical 
fish. 

137.  Such,  then,  being  the  definition  by  your  best  popular 
art,  of  the  ideal  of  feature  at  wThich  we  are  gradually  arriving  by 
self-manufacture  ;  when  I  place  opposite  to  it  (in  Plate  VIII) 
the  profile  of  a  man  not  in  any  wTise  self-made,  neither  by  the 
law  of  his  own  will,  nor  by  the  love  of  his  own  interest — nor 
capable,  for  a  moment,  of  any  kind  of  "  Independence,"  or  of 


LIKENESS. 


3G7 


the  idea  of  independence  ;  but  wholly  dependent  upon,  and 
subjected  to,  external  influence  of  just  law,  wise  teaching,  and 
trusted  love  and  truth,  in  his  fellow -spirits  ; — setting  before 
you,  I  say,  this  profile  of  a  God-made  instead  of  a  self-made, 
man,  I  know  that  you  will  feel,  on  the  instant,  that  you  are 
brought  into  contact  with  the  vital  elements  of  human  art  ; 
and  that  this,  the  sculpture  of  the  good,  is  indeed  the  only 
permissible  sculpture. 

138.  A  God-made  man,  I  say.  The  face,  indeed,  stands  as 
a  symbol  of  more  than  man  in  its  sculptor's  mind.  For  as  I 
gave  you,  to  lead  your  first  effort  in  the  form  of  leaves,  the 
sceptre  of  Apollo,  so  this,  which  I  give  you  as  the  first  type  of 
lightness  in  the  form  of  flesh,  is  the  countenance  of  the  holder 
of  that  sceptre,  the  Sun-God  of  Syracuse.  But  there  is  noth- 
ing in  the  face  (nor  did  the  Greek  suppose  there  was)  more 
perfect  than  might  be  seen  in  the  daily  beauty  of  the  creat- 
ures the  Sun-God  shone  upon,  and  whom  his  strength  and 
honour  animated.  This  is  not  an  ideal,  but  a  quite  literally 
true,  face  of  a  Greek  youth  ;  nay,  I  will  undertake  to  show 
you  that  it  is  not  supremely  beautiful,  and  even  to  surpass  it 
altogether  with  the  literal  portrait  of  an  Italian  one.  It  is  in 
verity  no  more  than  the  form  habitually  taken  by  the  features 
of  a  well  educated  young  Athenian  or  Sicilian  citizen  ;  and 
the  one  requirement  for  the  sculptors  of  to-day  is  not,  as  it 
has  been  thought,  to  invent  the  same  ideal,  but  merely  to  see 
the  same  reality. 

Now,  you  know  I  told  you  in  my  fourth  lecture,  that  the 
beginning  of  art  was  in  getting  our  country  clean  and  our 
people  beautiful,  and  you  supposed  that  to  be  a  statement  ir- 
relevant to  my  subject ;  just  as,  at  this  moment,  you  perhaps 
think,  I  am  quitting  the  great  subject  of  this  present  lecture 
— the  method  of  likeness-making — and  letting  myself  branch 
into  the  discussion  of  what  things  we  are  to  make  likeness  of. 
But  you  shall  see  hereafter  that  the  method  of  imitating  a 
beautiful  thing  must  be  different  from  the  method  of  imitat- 
ing an  ugly  one  ;  and  that,  with  the  change  in  subject  from 
what  is  dishonourable  to  what  is  honourable,  there  will  be  in- 
volved a  parallel  change  in  the  management  of  tools,  of  lines, 


368 


ARATRA  PENTELICL 


and  of  colours.  So  that  before  I  can  determine  for  you  horn 
you  are  to  imitate,  you  must  tell  me  what  kind  of  face  you 
wish  to  imitate.  The  best  draughtsmen  in  the  world  could 
not  draw  this  Apollo  in  ten  scratches,  though  he  can  draw  the 
self-made  man.  Still  less  this  nobler  Apollo  of  Ionian  Greece, 
(Plate  IX.)  in  which  the  incisions  are  softened  into  a  harmony 
like  that  of  Correggio's  painting.  So  that  you  see  the  method 
itself, — the  choice  between  black  incision  or  fine  sculpture, 
and  perhaps,  presently,  the  choice  between  colour  or  no 
colour,  will  depend  on  what  you  have  to  represent.  Colour 
may  be  expedient  for  a  glistening  dolphin  or  a  spotted  fawn  ; 
— perhaps  inexpedient  for  white  Poseidon,  and  gleaming 
Dian.  So  that,  before  defining  the  laws  of  sculpture,  I  am 
compelled  to  ask  you,  wltat  you  mean  to  carve  ;  and  that,  little 
as  you  think  it,  is  asking  you  how  you  mean  to  live,  and  what 
the  laws  of  your  State  are  to  be,  for  they  determine  those  of 
your  statue.  You  can  only  have  this  kind  of  face  to  study 
from,  in  the  sort  of  state  that  produced  it.  And  you  will  find 
that  sort  of  state  described  in  the  beginning  of  the  fourth 
book  of  the  laws  of  Plato  ;  as  founded,  for  one  thing,  on  the 
conviction  that  of  all  the  evils  that  can  happen  to  a  state, 
quantity  of  money  is  the  greatest  !  /xet£oj/  kclkov,  eVos  d-nCw, 
7ro/\et  ovSiv  av  yiyvotTO,  eis  yewaiuiv  kol  SikcuW  r/6W  Krrjo-iv,  "  for, 
to  speak  shortly,  no  greater  evil,  matching  each  against  each, 
can  possibly  happen  to  a  city,  as  adverse  to  its  forming  just 
or  generous  character,"  than  its  being  full  of  silver  and  gold. 

139.  Of  course,  the  Greek  notion  may  be  wrong,  and  ours 
right,  only — &  eVos  direiv — you  can  have  Greek  sculpture 
only  on  that  Greek  theory :  shortly  expressed  by  the  words 
put  into  the  mouth  of  Poverty  herself,  in  the  Plutus  of  Aris- 
tophanes "  Tov  ttXovtov  7rao€^a)  /3e\rcovaq  avSpas,  kol  ttjv  yvwfJLrjv, 
kol  T7}v  tSe'av."  "  I  deliver  to  you  better  men  than  the  God  of 
Money  can,  both  in  imagination  and  feature."  So  on  the 
other  hand,  this  ichthyoid,  reptilian,  or  mono-chondyloid 
ideal  of  the  self-made  man  can  only  be  reached,  universally, 
by  a  nation  which  holds  that  poverty,  either  of  purse  or  spirit, 
—but  especially  the  spiritual  character  of  being  Trrw^ot  rol 
TTvzvjxaTi,  is  the  lowest  of  degradations ;  and  which  believes 


Plate  IX. — Apollo  Ciirysocomes  of  Clazomenoz. 


LIKENESS. 


369 


that  the  desire  of  wealth  is  the  first  of  manly  and  moral  sen- 
timents. As  I  have  been. able  to  get  the  popular  ideal  repre- 
sented by  its  own  living  art,  so  I  can  give  you  this  popular 
faith  in  its  own  living  words  ;  but  in  words  meant  seriously 
and  not  at  all  as  caricature,  from  one  of  oar  leading  journals, 
professedly  aesthetic  also  in  its  very  name,  the  Spectator,  of 
August  6th,  1870. 

"  Mr.  Buskin's  plan,"  it  says,  "  would  make  England  poor, 
in  order  that  she  might  be  cultivated,  and  refined  and  artistic. 
A  wilder  proposal  was  never  broached  by  a  man  of  ability  ; 
and  it  might  be  regarded  as  a  proof  that  the  assiduous  study 
of  art  emasculates  the  intellect,  and  even  the  moral  sense.  Such 
a  theory  almost  warrants  the  contempt  with  which  art  is  often 
regarded  by  essentially  intellectual  natures,  like  Proudhon  " 
(sic).  "  Art  is  noble  as  the  flower  of  life,  and  the  creations  ot 
a  Titian  are  a  great  heritage  of  the  race  ;  but  if  England  could 
secure  high  art  and  Venetian  glory  of  colour  only  by  the  sacri- 
fice of  her  manufacturing  supremacy,  and  by  the  acceptance  of 
national  poverty,  then  the  pursuit  of  such  artistic  achievements 
would  imply  that  we  had  ceased  to  possess  natures  of  manly 
strength,  or  to  know  the  meaning  of  moral  aims.  If  we  must 
choose  between  a  Titian  and  a  Lancashire  cotton  mill,  then, 
in  the  name  of  manhood  and  of  morality,  give  us  the  cotton 
mill.  Only  the  dilettantism  of  the  studio  ;  that  dilettantism 
which  loosens  the  moral  no  less  than  the  intellectual  fibre,  and 
which  is  as  fatal  to  rectitude  of  action  as  to  correctness  of 
reasoning  power,  would  make  a  different  choice." 

You  see  also,  by  this  interesting  and  most  memorable  pas- 
sive, how  completely  the  question  is  admitted  to  be  one  of 
ethics — the  only  real  point  at  issue  being,  whether  this  face 
or  that  is  developed  on  the  truer  moral  principle. 

140.  I  assume,  however,  for  the  present,  that  this  Apolline 
type  is  the  kind  of  form  you  wish  to  reach  and  to  represent. 
And  now  observe,  instantly,  the  whole  question  of  manner  of 
imitation  is  altered  for  us.  The  fins  of  the  fish,  the  plumes  of 
the  swan,  and  the  flowing  of  the  Sun-God's  hair  are  all  repre- 
sented by  incisions — but  the  incisions  do  sufficiently  repre- 
sent the  hn  and  feather, — they  ^sufficiently  represent  the 


370 


ABA  TEA  PENTELICL 


hair.  If  I  chose,  with  a  little  more  care  and  labour,  I  could 
absolutely  get  the  surface  of  the  scales  and  spines  of  the  fish, 
and  the  expression  of  its  mouth  ;  but  no  quantity  of  labour 
would  obtain  the  real  surface  of  a  tress  of  Apollo's  hair,  and 
the  full  expression  of  his  mouth.  So  that  we  are  compelled 
at  once  to  call  the  imagination  to  help  us,  and  say  to  it,  You 
know  what  the  Apollo  Chrysocomes  must  be  like  ;  finish  all 
this  for  yourself.  Now,  the  law  under  which  imagination 
works,  is  just  that  of  other  good  workers.  "  You  must  give 
me  clear  orders  ;  show  me  what  I  have  to  do,  and  where  I  am 
to  begin,  and  let  me  alone."  And  the  orders  can  be  given, 
quite  clearly,  up  to  a  certain  point,  in  form  ;  but  they  cannot 
be  given  clearly  in  colour,  now  that  the  subject  is  subtle.  All 
beauty  of  this  high  kind  depends  on  harmony  ;  let  but  the 
slightest  discord  come  into  it,  and  the  finer  the  thing  is,  the 
more  fatal  will  be  the  flaw.  Now,  on  a  flat  surface,  I  can 
command  my  colour  to  be  precisely  what  and  where  I  mean 
it  to  be  ;  on  a  round  one  I  cannot.  For  all  harmony  depends 
first,  on  the  fixed  proportion  of  the  colour  of  the  light,  to  that 
of  the  relative  shadow  ;  and  therefore,  if  I  fasten  my  colour,  I 
must  fasten  my  shade.  But  on  a  round  surface  the  shadow 
changes  at  every  hour  of  the  day  ;  and  therefore,  all  colouring 
which  is  expressive  of  form,  is  impossible  ;  and  if  the  form  is 
fine,  (and  here  there  is  nothing  but  what  is  fine),  you  may  bid 
farewell  to  colour. 

141;  Farewell  to  colour  ;  that  is  to  say,  if  the  thing  is  to  be 
seen  distinctly,  and  you  have  only  wise  people  to  show  it  to  ; 
but  if  it  is  to  be  seen  indistinctly,  at  a  distance,  colour  may 
become  explanatory ;  and  if  you  have  simple  people  to  show 
it  to,  colour  may  be  necessary  to  excite  their  imaginations, 
though  not  to  excite  yours.  And  the  art  is  great  always 
by  meeting  its  conditions  in  the  straightest  way  ;  and  if  it  is 
to  please  a  multitude  of  innocent  and  bluntly-minded  persons, 
must  express  itself  in  the  terms  that  will  touch  them  ;  else  it 
is  not  good.  And  I  have  to  trace  for  you  through  the  history 
of  the  past,  and  possibilities  of  the  future,  the  expedients  used 
by  great  sculptors  to  obtain  clearness,  impressiveness,  or 
splendour  ;  and  the  manner  of  their  appeal  to  the  people. 


LIKENESS. 


371 


under  various  light  and  shadow,  and  with  reference  to  differ- 
ent degrees  of  public  intelligence  :  such  investigation  resolv- 
ing itself  again  and  again,  as  we  proceed,  into  questions 
absolutely  ethical ;  as  for  instance,  whether  colour  is  to  be 
bright  or  dull,  that  is  to  say,  for  a  populace  cheerful  or  heart- 
less ; — whether  it  is  to  be  delicate  or  strong,  that  is  to  say, 
for  a  populace  attentive  or  careless  ;  whether  it  is  to  be  a 
background  like  the  sky,  for  a  procession  of  young  men  and 
maidens,  because  your  populace  revere  life — or  the  shadow  of 
a  vault  behind  a  corpse,  stained  with  drops  of  blackened  blood, 
for  a  populace  taught  to  worship  Death.  Every  critical  deter- 
mination of  lightness  depends  on  the  obedience  to  some  ethic 
law,  by  the  most  rational  and,  therefore,  simplest,  means. 
And  you  see  how  it  depends  most,  of  all  things,  on  whether 
you  are  working  for  chosen  persons  or  for  the  mob ;  for  the 
joy  of  the  boudoir,  or  of  the  Borgo.  And  if  for  the  mob, 
whether  the  mob  of  Olympia,  or  of  St.  Antoine.  Phidias, 
showing  his  Jupiter  for  the  first  time,  hides  behind  the 
temple  door  to  listen,  resolved  afterwards,  "  pvOjjLt&tv  to 
dyakfia  7rpo<;  to  tois  7rAa'oT0ts  Sokovv,  ov  yap  rjytiro  fUKpav  elvai 
o-vfifSovX-qv  Stjulov  tocovtov"  and  truly,  as  your  people  is,  in 
judgment,  and  in  multitude,  so  must  your  sculpture  be,  in 
glory.  An  elementary  principle  which  has  been  too  long  out 
of  mind. 

142.  I  leave  you  to  consider  it,  since,  for  some  time,  we 
shall  not  again  be  able  to  take  up  the  inquiries  to  which  it 
leads.  But,  ultimately,  I  do  not  doubt  that  you  will  rest 
satisfied  in  these  following  conclusions  : 

1.  Not  only  sculpture,  but  all  the  other  fine  arts,  must  be 
for  the  people. 

2.  They  must  be  didactic  to  the  people,  and  that  as  their  chief 
end.  The  structural  arts,  didactic  in  their  manner ;  the 
graphic  arts  in  their  matter  also. 

3.  And  chiefly  the  great  representative  and  imaginative  arts, 
that  is  to  say,  the  drama,  and  sculpture,  are  to  teach  what  is 
noble  in  past  history,  and  lovely  in  existing  human  and  or- 
ganic life. 

4.  And  the  test  of  right  manner  of  execution  in  these  arts, 


372 


AEA  TEA  PENTEL1CI. 


is  that  they  strike,  in  the  most  emphatic  manner,  the  rank  of 
popular  minds  to  which  they  are  addressed. 

5.  And  the  test  of  utmost  fineness  in  execution  in  these 
arts,  is  that  they  make  themselves  be  forgotten  in  what  they 
represent ;  and  so  fulfil  the  words  of  their  greatest  Master, 

"The  best,  in  this  kind,  are  but  shadows." 


LECTUKE  V. 

STRUCTURE. 

December,  1870. 

143.  On  previous  occasions  of  addressing  you,  I  have  en- 
deavoured to  show  you,  first,  how  sculpture  is  distinguished 
from  other  arts  ;  then  its  proper  subjects,  then  its  proper 
method  in  the  realization  of  these  subjects.  To-day,  we 
must,  in  the  fourth  place,  consider  the  means  at  its  command 
for  the  accomplishment  of  these  ends  ;  the  nature  of  its  ma- 
terials ;  and  the  mechanical  or  other  difficulties  of  their  treat- 
ment. 

And  however  doubtful  we  may  have  remained,  as  to  the 
justice  of  Greek  ideals,  or  propriety  of  Greek  methods  of  rep- 
resenting them,  we  may  be  certain  that  the  example  of  the 
Greeks  will  be  instructive  in  all  practical  matters  relating  to 
this  great  art,  peculiarly  their  own.  I  think  even  the  evidence 
I  have  already  laid  before  you  is  enough  to  convince  you, 
that  it  was  by  rightness  and  reality,  not  by  idealism  or  delight- 
fulness  only,  that  their  minds  were  finally  guided  ;  and  I  am 
sure  that,  before  closing  the  present  course,  I  shall  be  able  so 
far  to  complete  that  evidence,  as  to  prove  to  you  that  the 
commonly  received  notions  of  classic  art  are,  not  only  un- 
founded, but  even  in  many  respects,  directly  contrary  to  the 
truth.  You  are  constantly  told  that  Greece  idealized  what- 
ever she  contemplated.  She  did  the  exact  contrary  :  she  real- 
ized and  verified  it.  You  are  constantly  told  she  sought  only 
the  beautiful.    She  sought,  indeed,  with  all  her  heart ;  but 


STRUCTURE. 


873 


she  found,  because  she  never  doubted  that  the  search  was  to 
be  consistent  with  propriety  and  common  sense.  And  the 
first  thing  you  will  always  discern  in  Greek  work  is  the  first 
which  you  ought  to  discern  in  all  work  ;  namely,  that  the 
object  of  it  has  been  rational,  and  has  been  obtained  by  sim- 
ple and  unostentatious  means. 

144.  "That  the  object  of  the  work  has  been  rational!" 
Consider  how  much  that  implies.  That  it  should  be  by  ail 
means  seen  to  have  been  determined  upon,  and  carried 
through,  with  sense  and  discretion  ;  these  being  gifts  of  intel- 
lect far  more  precious  than  any  knowledge  of  mathematics,  or 
of  the  mechanical  resources  of  art.  Therefore,  also,  that  it 
should  be  a  modest  and  temperate  work,  a  structure  fitted  to 
the  actual  state  of  men  ;  proportioned  to  their  actual  size,  as 
animals, — to  their  average  strength, — to  their  true  necessities, 
— and  to  the  degree  of  easy  command  they  have  over  the 
forces  and  substances  of  nature. 

145.  You  see  how  much  this  law  excludes  !  All  that  is 
fondly  magnificent,  insolently  ambitious,  or  vainly  difficult. 
There  is,  indeed,  such  a  thing  as  Magnanimity  in  design,  but 
never  unless  it  be  joined  also  with  modesty  and  JBjkanimiirjr. 
Nothing  extravagant,  monstrous,  strained,  or  singular,  can  be 
structurally  beautiful.  No  towers  of  Babel  envious  of  the 
skies  ;  no  pyramids  in  mimicry  of  the  mountains  of  the  earth  ; 
no  streets  that  are  a  weariness  to  traverse,  nor  temples  that 
make  pigmies  of  the  worshippers. 

It  is  one  of  the  primal  merits  and  decencies  of  Greek  work 
that  it  was,  on  the  whole,  singularly  small  in  scale,  and  wholly 
within  reach  of  sight,  to  its  finest  details.  And,  indeed,  the 
best  buildings  that  I  know  are  thus  modest ;  and  some  of 
the  best  are  minute  jewel  cases  for  sweet  sculpture.  The 
Parthenon  would  hardly  attract  notice,  if  it  were  set  by  the 
Charing  Cross  Railway  Station  :  the  Church  of  the  Miracoli, 
at  Venice,  the  Chapel  of  the  Rose,  at  Lucca,  and  the  Chapel 
of  the  Thorn,  at  Pisa,  would  not,  I  suppose,  all  three  together, 
fill  the  tenth  part,  cube,  of  a  transept  of  the  Crystal  Palace. 
And  they  are  better  so. 

146.  In  the  chapter  on  Power  in  the  "  Seven  Lamps  of  Archi- 


374 


A  RAT  It  A  PENTELICI. 


tecture,"  I  Lave  stated  what  seems,  at  first,  the  reverse  of  what 
I  am  saying*  now  ;  namely,  that  it  is  better  to  have  one  grand 
buildiug  than  any  number  of  mean  ones.  And  that  is  true, 
but  you  cannot  command  grandeur  by  size  till  you  can  com- 
mand grace  in  minuteness  ;  and  least  of  all,  remember,  will 
you  so  command  it  to-day,  when  magnitude  has  become  the 
chief  exponent  of  folly  and  misery,  co-ordinate  in  the  fra- 
ternal enormities  of  the  Factory  and  Poorhouse, — the  Bar- 
racks and  Hospital.  And  the  final  law  in  this  matter  is,  that 
if  you  require  edifices  only  for  the  grace  and  health  of  man- 
kind, and  build  them  without  pretence  and  without  chicanery, 
they  will  be  sublime  on  a  modest  scale,  and  lovely  with  little 
decoration. 

147.  From  these  principles  of  simplicity  and  temperance, 
two  very  severely  fixed  laws  of  construction  follow  ;  namely, 
first,  that  our  structure,  to  be  beautiful,  must  be  produced 
with  tools  of  men  ;  and  secondly,  that  it  must  be  composed 
of  natural  substances.  First,  I  say,  produced  with  tools  of 
men.  All  fine  art  requires  the  application  of  the  whole 
strength  and  subtlety  of  the  body,  so  that  such  art  is  not  pos- 
sible to  any  sickly  person,  but  involves  the  action  and  force  of 
a  strong  man's  arm  from  the  shoulder,  as  wrell  as  the  delicatest 
touch  of  his  finger  :  and  it  is  the  evidence  that  this  full  and 
fine  strength  has  been  spent  on  it  which  makes  the  art  execu- 
tively noble  ;  so  that  no  instrument  must  be  used,  habitually, 
which  is  either  too  heavy  to  be  delicately  restrained,  or  too  small 
and  weak  to  transmit  a  vigorous  impulse  ;  much  less  any 
mechanical  aid,  such  as  would  render  the  sensibility  of  the 
fingers  ineffectual.* 

148.  Of  course,  any  kind  of  work  in  glass,  or  in  metal,  on  a 

*  Nothing  is  more  wonderful,  or  more  disgraceful  among  the  forms 
of  ignorance  engendered  by  modern  vulgar  occupations  in  pursuit  of 
gain,  than  the  unconsciousness,  now  total,  that  fine  art  is  essentially 
Athletic.  I  received  a  letter  from  Birmingham,  some  little  time  since, 
inviting  me  to  see  how  much,  in  glass  manufacture,  "machinery 
excelled  rude  hand  work. "  The  writer  had  not  the  remotest  concep- 
tion that  he  might  as  well  have  asked  me  to  come  and  see  a  mechanical 
boat-race  rowed  by  automata,  and  "  how  much  machinery  excelled  rude 
arm- work. 7 


STRUCTURE. 


375 


large  scale,  involves  some  painful  endurance  of  heat ;  and 
working  in  clay,  some  habitual  endurance  of  cold  ;  but  the 
point  beyond  which  the  effort  must  not  be  carried  is  marked 
by  loss  of  power  of  manipulation.  As  long  as  the  eyes  and 
fingers  have  complete  command  of  the  material  (as  a  glass 
blower  has,  for  instance,  in  doing  fine  ornamental  work)  — 
the  law  is  not  violated  ;  but  all  our  great  engine  and  furnace 
work,  in  gun-making  and  the  like,  is  degrading  to  the  intel- 
lect ;  and  no  nation  can  long  persist  in  it  without  losing  many 
of  its  human  faculties.  Nay,  even  the  use  of  machinery,  other 
than  the  common  rope  and  puily,  for  the  lifting  of  weights,  is 
degrading  to  architecture  ;  the  invention  of  expedients  for  the 
raising  of  enormous  stones  has  always  been  a  characteristic  of 
partly  savage  or  corrupted  races.  A  block  of  marble  not 
larger  than  a  cart  with  a  couple  of  oxen  could  carry,  and  a 
cross-beam,  with  a  couple  of  pulleys,  raise,  is  as  large  as 
should  generally  be  used  in  any  building.  The  employment 
of  large  masses  is  sure  to  lead  to  vulgar  exhibitions  of  geomet- 
rical arrangement,*  and  to  draw  away  the  attention  from  tha 
sculpture.  In  general,  rocks  naturally  break  into  such  pieces 
as  the  human  beings  that  have  to  build  with  them  can  easily 
lift,  and  no  larger  should  be  sought  for. 

149.  In  this  respect,  and  in  many  other  subtle  ways,  tli8 
law  that  the  work  is  to  be  with  tools  of  men  is  connected 
with  the  farther  condition  of  its  modesty,  that  it  is  to  be 
wrought  in  substance  provided  by  Nature,  and  to  have  a 
faithful  respect  to  all  the  essential  qualities  of  such  substance. 

And  here  I  must  ask  your  attention  to  the  idea,  and,  more 
than  idea, — the  fact,  involved  in  that  infinitely  misused  term, 
"  Providentia,"  when  applied  to  the  Divine  Power.  In  its 
truest  sense  and  scholarly  use,  it  is  a  human  virtue,  YlpofAvfizia  ; 
the  personal  type  of  it  is  in  Prometheus,  and  all  the  first 
power  of  rixyy,  is  from  him,  as  compared  to  the  weakness  of 
days  wdien  men  without  foresight  "  Zfyvpov  tiicrj  ?raWa."  But, 
so  far  as  we  use  the  word  "  Providence  "  as  an  attribute  of  the 
Maker  and  Giver  of  all  things,  it  does  not  mean  that  in  a 

*Sucli  as  the  sculptureless  arch  of  Waterloo  Bridge,  for  instance, 
referred  to  in  the  Third  Lecture,  §  84. 


37G 


A  HA  Til  A  PENTELICL 


shipwreck  He  takes  care  of  the  passengers  who  are  to  be  saved 
and  takes  none  of  those  who  are  to  be  drowned  ;  but  it  docs 
mean  that  every  race  of  creatures  is  born  into  the  world  un- 
der circumstances  of  approximate  adaptation  to  its  necessities  ; 
and,  beyond  all  others,  the  ingenious  and  observant  race  cf 
man  is  surrounded  with  elements  naturally  good  for  his  food, 
pleasant  to  his  sight,  and  suitable  for  the  subjects  of  his  in- 
genuity ; —  the  stone,  metal,  and  clay  of  the  earth  he  walks 
upon  lending  themselves  at  once  to  his  hand,  for  all  manner 
of  workmanship. 

150.  Thus,  his  truest  respect  for  the  law  of  the  entire  crea- 
tion is  shown  by  his  making  the  most  of  what  he  can  get  most 
easily  ;  and  there  is  no  virtue  of  art,  nor  application  of  com- 
mon sense,  more  sacredly  necessary  than  this  respect  to  the 
beauty  of  natural  substance,  and  the  ease  of  local  use  ;  neither 
are  there  any  other  precepts  of  construction  so  vital  as  these 
— that  you  show  all  the  strength  of  your  material,  tempt  none 
of  its  weaknesses,  and  do  with  it  only  what  can  be  simply  and 
permanently  done. 

151.  Thus,  all  good  building  will  be  with  rocks,  or  pebbles, 
or  burnt  clay,  but  with  no  artificial  compound  ;  all  good  paint- 
ing, with  common  oils  and  pigments  on  common  canvas,  paper, 
plaster,  or  wood, — admitting,  sometimes  for  precious  work, 
precious  things,  but  all  applied  in  a  simple  and  visible  way. 
The  highest  imitative  art  should  not,  indeed,  at  first  sight,  call 
attention  to  the  means  of  it ;  but  even  that,  at  length,  should 
do  so  distinctly,  and  provoke  the  observer  to  take  pleasure  in 
seeing  how  completely  the  workman  is  master  of  the  particu- 
lar material  he  has  used,  and  how  beautiful  and  desirable  a 
substance  it  was,  for  work  of  that  kind.  In  oil  painting  its 
unctious  quality  is  to  be  delighted  in  ;  in  fresco,  its  chalky 
quality  ;  in  glass,  its  transparency  ;  in  wood,  its  grain  ;  in 
marble,  its  softness  ;  in  porphyry,  its  hardness  ;  in  iron,  its 
toughness.  In  a  flint  country,  one  should  feel  the  delightful- 
ness  of  having  flints  to  pick  up,  and  fasten  together  into  rug- 
ged walls.  In  a  marble  country  one  should  be  always  more 
and  more  astonished  at  the  exquisite  colour  and  structure  of 
marble  ;  in  a  slate  country  one  should  feel  as  if  every  rock 


STRUCTURE. 


377 


cleft  itself  only  for  the  sake  of  being  built  with  con- 
veniently. 

152.  Now,  for  sculpture,  there  are,  briefly,  two  materials — ■ 
Clay,  and  Stone  ;  for  glass  is  only  a  clay  that  gets  clear  and 
brittle  as  it  cools,  and  metal  a  clay  that  gets  opaque  and 
tough  as  it  cools.  Indeed,  the  true  use  of  gold  in  this  world 
is  only  as  a  very  pretty  and  very  ductile  clay,  which  you  can 
spread  as  flat  as  you  like,  spin  as  fine  as  you  like,  and  which 
will  neither  crack,  nor  tarnish. 

All  the  arts  of  sculpture  in  clay  may  be  summed  up  under 
the  word  "  Plastic,"  and  all  of  those  in  stone,  under  the  word 
"Glyptic." 

153.  Sculpture  in  clay  will  accordingly  include  all  cast 
brick-work,  pottery,  and  tile-work  * — a  somewhat  important 
branch  of  human  skill.  Next  to  the  potter's  work,  you  have 
all  the  arts  in  porcelain,  glass,  enamel,  and  metal ;  everything, 
that  is  to  say,  playful  and  familiar  in  design,  much  of  what  is 
most  felicitously  inventive,  and,  in  bronze  or  gold,  most  pre- 
cious and  permanent. 

154.  Sculpture  in  stone,  whether  granite,  gem,  or  marble, 
while  we  accurately  use  the  general  term  "glyptic"  for  it, 
may  be  thought  of  with,  perhaps,  the  most  clear  force  under 
the  English  word  "  engraving."  For,  from  the  mere  angular 
incision  which  the  Greek  consecrated  in  the  triglyphs  of  his 
greatest  order  of  architecture,  grow  forth  all  the  arts  of  bas- 
relief,  and  methods  of  localized  groups  of  sculpture  connected 
with  each  other  and  with  architecture  :  as,  in  another  direc- 
tion, the  arts  of  engraving  and  wood-cutting  themselves. 

155.  Over  all  this  vast  field  of  human  skill  the  laws  which  I 
have  enunciated  to  you  rule  with  inevitable  authority,  embrac- 
ing the  greatest,  and  consenting  to  the  humblest,  exertion  ; 
strong  to  repress  the  ambition  of  nations,  if  fantastic  and  vain, 
but  gentle  to  approve  the  efforts  of  children,  made  in  accord- 
ance with  the  visible  intention  of  the  Maker  of  all  flesh,  and 

*  It  is  strange,  at  this  day,  to  think  of  the  relation  of  the  Athenian 
Oeramicus  to  the  French  Tile-fields,  Tileries,  or  Tuileries  ;  and  how 
these  last  may  yet  become— have  already  partly  become  — "  the  Fotter' 
tield,"  blood-bought.    (December,  1870.) 


378 


ARATRA  PENTELIC1. 


the  Giver  of  all  Intelligence.  These  laws,  therefore,  I  now  re- 
peat, and  beg  of  you  to  observe  them  as  irrefragable. 

1.  That  the  work  is  to  be  with  tools  of  men. 

2.  That  it  is  to  be  in  natural  materials. 

3.  That  it  is  to  exhibit  the  virtues  of  those  materials,  and 
aim  at  no  quality  inconsistent  with  them. 

4.  That  its  temper  is  to  be  quiet  and  gentle,  in  harmony 
with  common  needs,  and  in  consent  to  common  intelli- 
gence. 

We  will  now  observe  the  bearing  of  these  laws  on  the  ele- 
mentary conditions  of  the  art  at  present  under  discussion. 

156.  There  is,  first,  work  in  baked  clay,  which  contracts  as 
it  dries,  and  is  very  easily  frangible.  Then  you  must  put  no 
work  into  it  requiring  niceness  in  dimension,  nor  any  so  elabo- 
rate that  it  would  be  a  great  loss  if  it  were  broken,  but  as  the 
clay  yields  at  once  to  the  hand,  and  the  sculptor  can  do  any- 
thing with  it  he  likes,  it  is  a  material  for  him  to  sketch  with 
and  play  with, — to  record  his  fancies  in,  before  they  escape 
him — and  to  express  roughly,  for  people  who  can  enjoy  such 
sketches,  what  he  has  not  time  to  complete  in  marble.  The 
clay,  being  ductile,  lends  itself  to  all  softness  of  line  ;  being 
easily  frangible,  it  would  be  ridiculous  to  give  it  sharp  edges, 
so  that  a  blunt  and  massive  rendering  of  graceidl  gesture  will 
be  its  natural  function  ;  but  as  it  can  be  pinched,  or  pulled, 
or  thrust  in  a  moment  into  projection  which  it  would  take 
hours  of  chiselling  to  get  in  stone,  it  will  also  properly  be 
used  for  all  fantastic  and  grotesque  form,  not  involving  sharp 
edges.  Therefore,  what  is  true  of  chalk  and  charcoal,  for 
painters,  is  equally  true  of  clay,  for  sculptors  ;  they  are  all 
most  precious  materials  for  true  masters,  but  tempt  the  false 
ones  into  fatal  license  ;  and  to  judge  rightly  of  terra-cotta 
work  is  a  far  higher  reach  of  skill  in  sculpture-criticism  than 
to  distinguish  the  merits  of  a  finished  statue. 

157.  We  have,  secondly,  work  in  bronze,  iron,  gold,  and 
other  metals  ;  in  which  the  laws  of  structure  are  still  more 
definite. 

All  kinds  of  twisted  and  wreathen  work  on  every  scale  be- 
come delightful  when  wrought  in  ductile  or  tenacious  metal ; 


STRUCTURE. 


379 


but  metal  which  is  to  be  hammered  into  form  separates  itself 
into  two  great  divisions — solid,  and  flat. 

(A.)  In  solid  metal  work,  i.  e.,  metal  cast  thick  enough  to 
resist  bending,  whether  it  be  hollow  or  not,  violent  and  various 
projection  may  be  admitted,  which  would  be  offensive  in  mar- 
ble ;  but  no  sharp  edges,  because  it  is  difficult  to  produce 
them  with  the  hammer.  But  since  the  permanence  of  the 
material  justifies  exquisiteness  of  workmanship,  whatever  del- 
icate ornamentation  can  be  wrought  with  rounded  surfaces 
may  be  advisedly  introduced  ;  and  since  the  colour  of  bronze 
or  any  other  metal  is  not  so  pleasantly  representative  of  flesh 
as  that  of  marble,  a  wise  sculptor  will  depend  less  on  flesh 
contour,  and  more  on  picturesque  accessories,  which,  though 
they  would  be  vulgar  if  attempted  in  stone,  are  rightly  enter- 
taining in  bronze  or  silver.  Verrochio's  statue 
of  Colleone  at  Venice,  Cellini's  Perseus  at 
Florence,  and  Ghiberti's  gates  at  Florence,  are 
models  of  bronze  treatment. 

(B.)  When  metal  is  beaten  thin,  it  becomes 
what  is  technically  called  "  plate,"  (the  flattened 
thing)  and  may  be  treated  advisably  in  two  ways  ; 
one,  by  beating  it  out  into  bosses,  the  other  by 
cutting  it  into  strips  and  ramifications.  The 
vast  schools  of  goldsmith's  work  and  of  iron  dec- 
oration, founded  on  these  two  principles,  have 
had  the  most  powerful  influences  over  general 
taste  in  all  ages  and  countries.  One  of  the  sim- 
plest and  most  interesting  elementary  examples 
of  the  treatment  of  fiat  metal  by  cutting  is  the 
common  branched  iron  bar,  Fig.  8,  used  to  close 
small  apertures  in  countries  possessing  any  good 
primitive  style  of  ironwork,  formed  by  alternate  cuts  on  its 
sides,  and  the  bending  down  of  the  several  portions.  The 
ordinary  domestic  window  balcony  of  Verona  is  formed  by 
mere  ribands  of  iron,  bent  into  curves  as  studiously  refined 
as  those  of  a  Greek  vase,  and  decorated  merely  by  their  owrn 
terminations  in  spiral  volutes. 

All  cast  work  in  metal,  unfinished  by  hand,  is  inadmissible 


380 


ABA  TEA  PEN  IE  LI  CI. 


in  an}7  school  of  living  art,  since  it  cannot  possess  the  perfec- 
tion of  form  due  to  a  permanent  substance  ;  and  the  continual 
sight  of  it  is  destructive  of  the  faculty  of  taste  :  but  metal 
stamped  with  precision,  as  in  coins,  is  to  sculpture  what  en- 
graving is  to  painting. 

158.  Thirdly.  Stone-sculpture  divides  itself  into  three 
schools :  one  in  very  hard  material ;  one  in  very  soft,  and  one 
in  that  of  centrally  useful  consistence. 

A.  The  virtue  of  work  in  hard  material  is  the  expression  of 
form  in  shallow  relief,  or  in  broad  contours  ;  deep  cutting  in 
hard  material  is  inadmissible,  and  the  art,  at  once  pompous 
and  trivial,  of  gem  engraving,  has  been  in  the  last  degree 
destructive  of  the  honour  and  service  of  sculpture. 

B.  The  virtue  of  work  in  soft  material  is  deep  cutting,  with 
studiously  graceful  disposition  of  the  masses  of  light  and 
shade.  The  greater  number  of  flamboyant  churches  of  France 
are  cut  out  of  an  adhesive  chalk  ;  and  the  fantasy  of  their 
latest  decoration  was,  in  great  part,  induced  by  the  facility  of 
obtaining  contrast  of  black  space,  undercut,  with  white  tracery 
easily  left  in  sweeping  and  interwoven  rods — the  lavish  use  of 
wood  in  domestic  architecture  materially  increasing  the  habit 
of  delight  in  branched  complexity  of  line.  These  points, 
however,  I  must  reserve  for  illustration  in  my  lectures  on  ar- 
chitecture. To-day,  I  shall  limit  myself  to  the  illustration  of 
elementary  sculptural  structure  in  the  best  material ; — that  is 
to  say,  in  crystalline  marble,  neither  soft  enough  to  encourage 
the  caprice  of  the  workman,  nor  hard  enough  to  resist  his 
will. 

159.  C.  By  the  true  ' '  Providence "  of  Nature,  the  rock 
which  is  thus  submissive  has  been  in  some  places  stained  with 
the  fairest  colours,  and  in  others  blanched  into  the  fairest  ab- 
sence of  colour,  that  can  be  found  to  give  harmony  to  inlay- 
ing, or  dignity  to  form.  The  possession  by  the  Greeks  of 
their  Xcvkos  At#os  was  indeed  the  first  circumstance  regulating 
the  development  of  their  art ;  it  enabled  them  at  once  to  ex- 
press their  passion  for  light  by  executing  the  faces,  hands,  and 
feet  of  their  dark  wooden  statues  in  white  marble,  so  that 
what  we  look  upon  only  with  pleasure  for  fineness  of  texture 


STRUCTURE. 


881 


was  to  them  an  imitation  of  the  luminous  body  of  the  deity 
shining  from  behind  its  dark  robes ;  and  ivory  afterwards 
is  employed  in  their  best  statues  for  its  yet  more  soft  and 
flesh-like  brightness,  receptive  also  of  the  most  delicate  colour 
— (therefore  to  this  day  the  favourite  ground  of  miniature 
painters).  In  like  manner,  the  existence  of  quarries  of  peach- 
coloured  marble  within  twelve  miles  of  Verona,  and  of  white 
marble  and  green  serpentine  between  Pisa  and  Genoa,  defined 
the  manner  both  of  sculpture  and  architecture  for  all  the 
Gothic  buildings  of  Italy.  No  subtlety  of  education  could 
have  formed  a  high  school  of  art  without  these  materials. 

160.  Next  to  the  colour,  the  fineness  of  substance  which 
will  take  a  perfectly  sharp  edge,  is  essential ;  and  this  not 
merely  to  admit  fine  delineation  in  the  sculpture  itself,  but  to 
secure  a  delightful  precision  in  placing  the  blocks  of  which  it 
is  composed.  For  the  possession  of  too  fine  marble,  as  far  as 
regards  the  work  itself,  is  a  temptation  instead  of  an  advantage 
to  an  inferior  sculptor  ;  and  the  abuse  of  the  facility  of  under- 
cutting, especially  of  undercutting  so  as  to  leave  profiles  de- 
fined by  an  edge  against  shadow,  is  one  of  the  chief  causes  of 
decline  of  style  in  such  encrusted  bas-reliefs  as  those  of  the 
Certosa  of  Pavia  and  its  contemporary  monuments.  But  no 
undue  temptation  ever  exists  as  to  the  fineness  of  block  fit- 
ting ;  nothing  contributes  to  give  so  pure  and  healthy  a  tone 
to  sculpture  as  the  attention  of  the  builder  to  the  jointing  of 
his  stones ;  and  his  having  both  the  power  to  make  them  fit  so 
perfectly  as  not  to  admit  of  the  slightest  portion  of  cement 
showing  externally,  and  the  skill  to  insure,  if  needful,  and  to 
suggest  always,  their  stability  in  cementless  construction. 
Plate  X.  represents  a  piece  of  entirely  fine  Lombardic  build- 
ing, the  central  portion  of  the  arch  in  the  Duomo  of  Verona, 
which  corresponds  to  that  of  the  porch  of  San  Zenone,  repre- 
sented in  Plate  I.  In  both  these  pieces  of  building,  the  only 
line  that  traces  the  architrave  round  the  arch,  is  that  of  the 
masonry  joint ;  yet  this  line  is  drawn  with  extremest  subtlety, 
with  intention  of  delighting  the  eye  by  its  relation  of  varied 
curvature  to  the  arch  itself  ;  and  it  is  just  as  much  considered 
as  the  finest  pen-line  of  a  Raphael  drawing.    Every  joint  of 


382 


ARATRA  PEN TEL  101. 


the  stone  is  used,  in  like  manner,  as  a  thin  black  line,  which 
the  slightest  sign  of  cement  would  spoil  like  a  blot.  And  so 
proud  is  the  builder  of  his  fine  jointing,  and  so  fearless  of 
any  distortion  or  strain  spoiling  the  adjustment  afterwards, 
that  in  one  place  he  runs  his  joint  quite  gratuitously  through 
a  bas-relief,  and  gives  the  keystone  its  only  sign  of  pre-emi- 
nence by  the  minute  inlaying  of  the  head  of  the  Lamb,  into 
the  stone  of  the  course  above. 

161.  Proceeding  from  this  fine  jointing  to  fine  draughts- 
manship, you  have,  in  the  very  outset  and  earliest  stage  of 
sculpture,  your  flat  stone  surface  given  you  as  a  sheet  of  white 
paper,  on  which  you  are  required  to  produce  the  utmost  effect 
you  can  with  the  simplest  means,  cutting  away  as  little  of  the 
stone  as  may  be,  to  save  both  time  and  trouble  ;  and,  above 
all,  leaving  the  block  itself,  when  shaped,  as  solid  as  you  can, 
that  its  surface  may  better  resist  weather,  and  the  carved  parts 
be  as  much  protected  as  possible  by  the  masses  left  around 
them. 

162.  The  first  thing  to  be  done  is  clearly  to  trace  the  out- 
line of  subject  with  an  incision  approximating  in  section  to 
that  of  the  furrow  of  a  plough,  only  more  equal-sided.  A  fine 
sculptor  strikes  it,  as  his  chisel  leans,  freely,  on  marble  ;  an 
Egyptian,  in  hard  rock,  cuts  it  sharp,  as  in  cuneiform  inscrip- 
tions. In  any  case,  you  have  a  result  somewhat  like  the 
upper  figure,  Plate  XL,  in  which  I  show  you  the  most  ele- 
mentary indication  of  form  possible,  by  cutting  the  outline  of 
the  typical  archaic  Greek  head  with  an  incision  like  that  of  a 
Greek  triglyph,  only  not  so  precise  in  edge  or  slope,  as  it  is  to 
be  modified  afterwards. 

163.  Now,  the  simplest  thing  we  can  do  next,  is  to  round 
off  the  flat  surface  ivithin  the  incision,  and  put  what  form  wTe 
can  get  into  the  feebler  projection  of  it  thus  obtained.  The 
Egyptians  do  this,  often  with  exquisite  skill,  and  then,  as  I 
showed  you  in  a  former  lecture,  colour  the  whole — using  the 
incision  as  an  outline.  Such  a  method  of  treatment  is  capable 
of  good  service  in  representing,  at  little  cost  of  pains,  subjects 
in  distant  effect,  and  common,  or  merely  picturesque,  subjects 
even  near.    To  show  you  what  it  is  capable  of,  and  what 


Plate  XI. — The  First  Elements  of  Sculpture, 
Incised  Outline  and  Opened  Space. 


STRUCTURE. 


383 


coloured  sculpture  would  be  in  its  rudest  type,  I  have  pre- 
pared  the  coloured  relief  of  the  John  Dory  *  as  a  natural  his- 
tory drawing  for  distant  effect.  You  know,  also,  that  I  meant 
him  to  be  ugly — as  ugly  as  any  creature  can  well  be.  In 
time,  I  hope  to  show  you  prettier  things — peacocks  and  king- 
fishers,— butterflies  and  flowers,  on  grounds  of  gold,  and  the 
like,  as  they  were  in  Byzantine  work.  I  shall  expect  you,  in 
right  use  of  your  aesthetic  faculties,  to  like  those  better  than 
what  I  show  you  to-day.  But  it  is  now  a  question  of  method 
only  ;  and  if  you  will  look,  after  the  lecture,  first  at  the  mere 
white  relief,  and  then  see  how  much  may  be  gained  by  a  few 
dashes  of  colour,  such  as  a  practised  workman  could  lay  in  a 
quarter  of  an  hour,— the  whole  forming,  if  well  done,  almost  a 
deceptive  image — you  will,  at  least,  have  the  range  of  power 
in  Egyptian  sculpture  clearly  expressed  to  you. 

164.  But  for  fine  sculpture,  we  must  advance  by  far  other 
methods.  If  we  carve  the  subject  with  real  delicacy,  the  cast 
shadow  of  the  incision  will  interfere  with  its  outline,  so  that, 
for  representation  of  beautiful  things,  you  must  clear  away 
the  ground  about  it,  at  all  events  for  a  little  distance.  As  the 
law  of  work  is  to  use  the  least  pains  possible,  you  clear  it  only 
just  as  far  back  as  you  need,  and  then  for  the  sake  of  order 
and  finish,  you  give  the  space  a  geometrical  outline.  By  tak- 
ing, in  this  case,  the  simplest  I  can, — a  circle, — I  can  clear 
the  head  with  little  labor  in  the  removal  of  surface  round  it ; 
(see  the  lower  figure  in  Plate  XI.) 

165.  Now,  these  are  the  first  terms  of  all  well-constructed 
bas-relief.  The  mass  you  have  to  treat  consists  of  a  piece  of 
stone,  which,  however  you  afterwards  carve  it,  can  but,  at  its 
most  projecting  point,  reach  the  level  of  the  external  plane 
surface  out  of  which  it  was  mapped,  and  defined  by  a  depres- 
sion round  it  ;  that  depression  being  at  first  a  mere  trench, 
then  a  moat  of  certain  width,  of  which  the  outer  sloping  bank 
is  in  contact,  as  a  limiting  geometrical  line,  with  the  laterally 
salient  portions  of  sculpture.    This,  I  repeat,  is  the  primal 

*  This  relief  is  now  among  the  other  casts  which  I  have  placed  in  tha 
lower  school  in  the  University  galleries. 


384 


ARATIIA  PENTELTCL 


construction  of  good  bas-relief,  implying,  first,  perfect  pro- 
tection to  its  surface  from  any  transverse  blow,  and  a  geo- 
metrically limited  space  to  be  occupied  by  the  design ,  into 
which  it  shall  pleasantly  (and  as  you  shall  ultimately  see, 
ingeniously,)  contract  itself:  implying,  secondly,  a  determined 
depth  of  projection,  which  it  shall  rarely  reach,  and  never  ex- 
ceed :  and  implying,  finally,  the  production  of  the  whole  piece 
with  the  least  possible  labor  of  chisel  and  loss  of  stone. 

166.  And  these,  which  are  the  first,  are  very  nearly  the  last 
constructive  laws  of  sculpture.  You  will  be  surprised  to  find 
how  much  they  include,  and  how  much  of  minor  propriety  in 
treatment  their  observance  involves. 

In  a  very  interesting  essay  on  the  architecture  of  the  Par- 
thenon, by  the  professor  of  architecture  of  the  Ecole  Polytech- 
nique,  M.  Emile  Boutmy,  you  will  find  it  noticed  that  the 
Greeks  do  not  usually  weaken,  by  carving,  the  constructive 
masses  of  their  building  ;  but  put  their  chief  sculpture  in  the 
empty  spaces  between  the  triglyphs,  or  beneath  the  roof. 
This  is  true  ;  but  in  so  doing,  they  merely  build  their  panel 
instead  of  carving  it ;  they  accept  no  less  than  the  Goths,  the 
laws  of  recess  and  limitation,  as  being  vital  to  the  safety  and 
dignity  of  their  design  ;  and  their  noblest  recumbent  statues 
are,  constructively,  the  fillings  of  the  acute  extremity  of  a 
panel  in  the  form  of  an  obtusely  summitted  triangle. 

167.  In  gradual  descent  from  that  severest  type,  you  will 
find  that  an  immense  quantity  of  sculpture  of  all  times  and 
styles  may  be  generally  embraced  under  the  notion  of  a  mass 
hewn  out  of,  or,  at  least,  placed  in,  a  panel  or  recess,  deepen- 
ing, it  may  be,  into  a  niche  ;  the  sculpture  being  alwrays  de- 
signed with  reference  to  its  position  in  such  recess  ;  and,, 
therefore,  to  the  effect  of  the  building  out  of  which  the  re- 
cess is  hewn. 

But,  for  the  sake  of  simplifying  our  inquiry,  I  will  at  first 
suppose  no  surrounding  protective  ledge  to  exist,  and  that  the 
area  of  stone  we  have  to  deal  with  is  simply  a  flat  slab,  extant 
from  a  flat  surface  depressed  all  round  it. 

168.  Aflat  slab,  observe.  The  flatness  of  surface  is  essen- 
tial to  the  problem  of  bas-relief.    The  lateral  limit  of  the 


8TRUCTUHE. 


385 


panel  may,  or  may  not,  be  required  ;  but  the  vertical  limit  of 
surface  must  be  expressed ;  and  the  art  of  bas-relief  is  to 
give  the  effect  of  true  form  on  that  condition.  For  observe, 
if  nothing  more  were  needed  than  to  make  first  a  cast  of  a 
solid  form,  then  cut  it  in  half,  and  apply  the  half  of  it  to  the 
flat  surface  ; — if,  for  instance,  to  carve  a  bas-relief  of  an  ap- 
ple, all  I  had  to  do  was  to  cut  my  sculpture  of  the  whole  apple 
in  half,  and  pin  it  to  the  wall,  any  ordinary  trained  sculptor, 
or  even  a  mechanical  workman,  could  produce  bas-relief ; 
but  the  business  is  to  carve  a  round  thing  out  of  a  flat  thing  ; 
to  carve  an  apple  out  of  a  biscuit ! — to  conquer,  as  a  subtle 
Florentine  has  here  conquered,*  his  marble,  so  as  not  only  to 
get  motion  into  what  is  most  rigidly  fixed,  but  to  get  bound- 
lessness into  what  is  most  narrowly  bounded  ;  and  carve  Ma- 
donna and  Child,  rolling  clouds,  flying  angels,  and  space  of 
heavenly  air  behind  all,  out  of  a  film  of  stone  not  the  third  of 
an  inch  thick  where  it  is  thickest. 

169.  Carried,  however,  to  such  a  degree  of  subtlety  as  this, 
and  with  so  ambitious  and  extravagant  aim,  bas-relief  be- 
comes a  tour-de-force  ;  and,  you  know,  I  have  just  told  you 
all  tours-de-force  are  wrong.  The  true  law  of  bas-relief  is  to 
begin  with  a  depth  of  incision  proportioned  justly  to  the  dis- 
tance of  the  observer  and  the  character  of  the  subject,  and  out 
of  that  rationally  determined  depth,  neither  increased  for  os- 
tentation of  effect,  nor  diminished  for  ostentation  of  skill,  to 
do  the  utmost  that  will  be  easily  visible  to  an  observer,  sup- 
posing him  to  give  an  average  human  amount  of  attention, 
but  not  to  peer  into,  or  critically  scrutinize  the  work. 

170.  I  cannot  arrest  you  to  day  by  the  statement  of  any  of 
the  laws  of  sight  and  distance  which  determine  the  proper 
depth  of  bas-relief.  Suppose  that  depth  fixed  ;  then  observe 
what  a  pretty  problem,  or,  rather,  continually  varying  cluster 
of  problems,  will  be  offered  to  us.  You  might,  at  first,  imag- 
ine that,  given  what  we  may  call  our  scale  of  solidity,  or  scale 
of  depth,  the  diminution  from  nature  would  be  in  regular 

*  The  reference  is  to  a  cast  from  a  small  and  low  relief  of  Florentine 
work  in  the  Kensington  Museum. 


88G  ARaTRA  RENTE Ll CI. 

proportion,  as  for  instance,  if  the  real  depth  of  your  subject 
be,  suppose  a  foot,  and  the  depth  of  your  bas-relief  an  inch, 
then  the  parts  of  the  real  subject  which  were  six  inches  round 
the  side  of  it  would  be  carved,  you  might  imagine,  at  the 
depth  of  half-an-inch,  and  so  the  whole  thing  mechanically 
reduced  to  scale.  But  not  a  bit  of  it.  Here  is  a  Greek  bas- 
relief  of  a  chariot  with  two  horses  (upper  figure,  Plate  XXI). 
Your  whole  subject  has  therefore  the  depth  of  two  horses  side 
by  side,  say  six  or  eight  feet.  Your  bas-relief  has,  on  the 
scale,*  say  the  depth  of  the  third  of  an  inch.  Now,  if  you 
gave  only  the  sixth  of  an  inch  for  the  depth  of  the  off  horse, 
and,  dividing  him  again,  only  the  twelfth  of  an  inch  for  that 
of  each  foreleg,  you  would  make  him  look  a  mile  away  from 
the  other,  and  his  own  forelegs  a  mile  apart.  Actually,  the 
Greek  has  made  the  near  leg  of  the  off  horse  project  much  be- 
yond the  off  leg  of  the  near  horse ;  and  has  put  nearly  the 
whole  depth  and  power  of  his  relief  into  the  breast  of  the  off 
horse,  while  for  the  whole  distance  from  the  head  of  the  near- 
est to  the  neck  of  the  other,  he  has  allowed  himself  only  a 
shallow  line  ;  knowing  that,  if  he  deepened  that,  he  would 
give  the  nearest  horse  the  look  of  having  a  thick  nose  ;  where- 
as, by  keeping  that  line  down,  he  has  not  only  made  the  head 
itself  more  delicate,  but  detached  it  from  the  other  by  giving 
no  cast  shadow,  and  left  the  shadow  below  to  serve  for  thick- 
ness of  breast,  cutting  it  as  sharp  down  as  he  possibly  can,  to 
make  it  bolder. 

171.  Here  is  a  fine  piece  of  business  we  have  got  into ! 
— even  supposing  that  all  this  selection  and  adaptation  were 
to  be  contrived  under  constant  laws,  and  related  only  to  the 
expression  of  given  forms.  But  the  Greek  sculptor,  all  this 
while,  is  not  only  debating  and  deciding  how  to  show  what 
he  wants,  but,  much  more,  debating  and  deciding  what,  as  he 
can't  show  everything,  he  will  choose  to  show  at  all.  Thus, 
being  himself  interested,  and  supposing  that  you  will  be,  in 

*  The  actual  bas-relief  is  on  a  coin,  and  the  projection  not  above  the 
twentieth  of  an  inch,  but  I  magnified  it  in  photograph,  for  this  Lecture, 
so  as  to  represent  a  relief  with  about  the  third  of  an  inch  for  maximum 
projection. 


STRUCTURE. 


387 


the  manner  of  the  driving,  he  takes  great  pains  to  carve  the 
reins,  to  show  you  where  they  are  knotted,  and  how  they  are 
fastened  round  the  driver's  waist  (you  recollect  how  Hippoly- 
tus  was  lost  by  doing  that),  but  he  does  not  care  the  least  bit 
about  the  chariot,  and  having  rather  more  geometry  than  he 
likes  in  the  cross  and  circle  of  one  wheel  of  it,  entirely  omits 
the  other  ! 

172.  I  think  you  must  see  by  this  time  that  the  sculptors 
is  not  quite  a  trade  which  you  can  teach  like  brickmaking ; 
nor  its  produce  an  article  of  which  you  can  supply  any  quan- 
tity "  demanded  "  for  the  next  railroad  waiting-room.  It  may 
perhaps,  indeed,  seem  to  you  that,  in  the  difficulties  thus  pre- 
sented by  it,  bas-relief  involves  more  direct  exertion  of  intel- 
lect than  finished  solid  sculpture.  It  is  not  so,  however.  The 
questions  involved  by  bas-relief  are  of  a  more  curious  and 
amusing  kind,  requiring  great  variety  of  expedients  ;  though 
none  except  such  as  a  true  workmanly  instinct  delights  in  in- 
venting and  invents  easily  ;  but  design  in  solid  sculpture  in- 
volves considerations  of  weight  in  mass,  of  balance,  of  per- 
spective and  opposition,  in  projecting  forms,  and  of  restraint 
for  those  which  must  not  project,  such  as  none  but  the  great- 
est masters  have  over  completely  solved  ;  and  they,  not  always  ; 
the  difficulty  of  arranging  the  composition  so  as  to  be  agree- 
able from  points  of  view  on  all  sides  of  it,  being,  itself,  arduous 
enough. 

173.  Thus  far,  I  have  been  speaking  only  of  the  laws  of 
structure  relating  to  the  projection  of  the  mass  which  becomes 
itself  the  sculpture.  Another  most  interesting  group  of  con- 
structive laws  governs  its  relation  to  the  line  that  contains  or 
defines  it. 

In  your  Standard  Series  I  have  placed  a  photograph  of  the 
south  transept  of  Eouen  Cathedral.  Strictly  speaking,  all 
standards  of  Gothic  are  of  the  thirteenth  century  ;  but,  in  the 
fourteenth,  certain  qualities  of  richness  are  obtained  by  the 
diminution  of  restraint ;  out  of  which  we  must  choose  what  is 
best  in  their  kinds.  The  pedestals  of  the  statues  which  once 
occupied  the  lateral  recesses  are,  as  you  see,  covered  with 
groups  of  figures,  enclosed  each  in  a  quatrefoil  panel;  tha 


388 


ARATRA  RENTE LIC I. 


spaces  between  this  panel  and  the  enclosing  square  being 
filled  with  sculptures  of  animals. 

You  cannot  anywhere  find  a  more  lovely  piece  of  fancy,  or 
more  illustrative  of  the  quantity  of  result  that  may  be  obtained 
with  low  and  simple  chiselling.  The  figures  are  ail  perfectly 
simple  in  drapery,  the  story  told  by  lines  of  action  only  in  the 
main  group,  no  accessories  being  admitted.  There  is  no  un- 
dercutting anywhere,  nor  exhibition  of  technical  skill,  but 
the  fondest  and  tenderest  appliance  of  it ;  and  one  of  the  prin- 
cipal charms  of  the  whole  is  the  adaptation  of  every  subject 
to  its  quaint  limit.  The  tale  must  be  told  within  the  four 
petals  of  the  quatrefoil,  and  the  wildest  and  playfullest  beasts 
must  never  come  out  of  their  narrow  corners.  The  attention 
with  which  spaces  of  this  hind  are  filled  by  the  Gothic  design- 
ers is  not  merely  a  beautiful  compliance  with  architectural  re- 
quirements, but  a  definite  assertion  of  their  delight  in  the 
restraint  of  law  ;  for,  in  illuminating  books,  although,  if  they 
chose  it,  they  might  have  designed  floral  ornaments,  as  we 
now  usually  do,  rambling  loosely  over  the  leaves,  and  although, 
in  later  works,  such  license  is  often  taken  by  them,  in  all  books 
of  the  fine  time  the  wandering  tendrils  are  enclosed  by  limits 
approximately  rectilinear,  and  in  gracefullest  branching  often 
detach  themselves  from  the  right  line  only  by  curvature  of  ex- 
treme severity. 

174.  Since  the  darkness  and  extent  of  shadow  by  which 
the  sculpture  is  relieved  necessarily  vary  with  the  depth  of  the 
recess,  there  arise  a  series  of  problems,  in  deciding  which  the 
wholesome  desire  for  emphasis  by  means  of  shadow  is  too  often 
exaggerated  by  the  ambition  of  the  sculptor  to  show  his  skill 
in  undercutting.  The  extreme  of  vulgarity  is  usually  reached 
when  the  entire  bas-relief  is  cut  hollow  underneath,  as  in 
much  Indian  and  Chinese  work,  so  as  to  relieve  its  forms 
against  an  absolute  darkness  ;  but  no  formal  law  can  ever  be 
given  ;  for  exactly  the  same  thing  may  be  beautifully  done  for 
a  wise  purpose,  by  one  person,  which  is  basely  done,  and  to 
no  purpose,  or  to  a  bad  one,  by  another.  Thus,  the  desire  for 
emphasis  itself  may  be  the  craving  of  a  deadened  imagination, 
or  the  passion  of  a  vigorous  one  ;  and  relief  against  shadow 


STRUCTURE. 


389 


may  be  sought  by  one  man  only  for  sensation,  and  by  another 
for  intelligibility.  John  of  Pisa  undercuts  fiercely,  in  order 
to  bring  out  the  vigour  of  life  which  no  level  contour  could 
render  ;  the  Lombard i  of  Venice  undercut  delicately,  in  order 
to  obtain  beautiful  lines,  and  edges  of  faultless  precision  ;  but 
the  base  Indian  craftsmen  undercut  only  that  people  may 
yonder  how  the  chiselling  was  done  through  the  holes,  or  that 
tEyey  may  see  every  monster  white  against  black. 

175.  Yet,  here  again  we  are  met  by  another  necessity  for 
dist  animation.  There  may  be  a  true  delight  in  the  inlaying 
of  w.nte  on  dark,  as  there  is  a  true  delight  in  vigorous  round- 
ing. Nevertheless,  the  general  law  is  always,  that,  the  lighter 
the  in  isions,  and  the  broader  the  surface,  the  grander,  ceteris 
paribus,  will  be  the  work.  Of  the  structural  terms  of  that 
work  you  now  know  enough  to  understand  that  the  schools  of 
good  sculpture,  considered  in  relation  to  projection,  divide 
themselves  into  four  entirely  distinct  groups  : — 

1st.  Flat  Relief,  in  which  the  surface  is,  in  many  places, 
absolutely  flat  ;  and  the  expression  depends  greatly 
on  the  lines  of  its  outer  contour,  and  on  fine  incis- 
ions within  them. 

2nd.  Round  Relief,  in  which,  as  in  the  best  coins,  the  sculpt- 
ured mass  projects  so  as  to  be  capable  of  complete 
modulation  into  form,  but  is  not  anywhere  undercut. 
The  formation  of  a  coin  by  the  blow  of  a  die  neces- 
sitates, oi  course,  the  severest  obedience  to  this  law. 

3rd.  Edged  Relief.  Undercutting  admitted,  so  as  to  throw 
out  the  for  ns  against  a  background  of  shadow. 

4th.  Full  Relief.  The  statue  completely  solid  in  form,  and 
unreduced  in  retreating  depth  of  it,  yet  connected 
locally  with  some  definite  part  of 'the  building,  so  as 
to  be  still  dependent  on  the  shadow  of  its  back- 
ground and  dii  action  of  protective  line. 

176.  Let  me  recomme>  d  you  at  once  to  take  what  pains 
may  be  needful  to  enable  )ou  to  distinguish  these  four  kinds 
of  sculpture,  for  the  distinctions  between  them  are  not  founded 
on  mere  differences  in  gracation  of  depth.  They  are  truly 
four  species,  or  orders,  of  scujpture,  separated  from  each  other 


390 


ARATRA  PENTELICI. 


by  determined  characters.  I  have  used,  you  may  have  noted, 
hitherto  in  my  Lectures,  the  word  "  bas-relief  "  almost  indis- 
criminately for  all,  because  the  degree  of  lowness  or  highness 
of  relief  is  not  the  question,  but  the  method  of  relief.  Observe 
again,  therefore — 

A.  If  a  portion  of  the  surface  is  absolutely  flat,  you  have  the 
first  order — Flat  Relief. 

B.  If  every  portion  of  the  surface  is  rounded,  but  none  un- 
dercut, you  have  Round  Relief — essentially  that  of  seals  and 
coins. 

C.  If  any  part  of  the  edges  be  undercut,  but  the  general 
projection  of  solid  form  reduced,  you  have  what  I  think  you 
may  conveniently  call  Foliate  Relief, — the  parts  of  the  design 
overlapping  each  other  in  places,  like  edges  of  leaves. 

D.  If  the  undercutting  is  bold  and  deep,  and  the  projection 
of  solid  form  unreduced,  you  have  full  relief. 

Learn  these  four  names  at  once  by  heart : — 
Flat  Relief. 
Round  Relief. 
Foliate  Relief. 
Full  Relief. 

And  whenever  you  look  at  any  piece  of  sculpture,  determine 
first  to  which  of  these  classes  it  belongs  ;  and  then  consider 
how  the  sculptor  has  treated  it  with  reference  to  the  neces- 
sary structure — that  reference,  remember,  being  partly  to  the 
mechanical  conditions  of  the  material,  partly  to  the  means  of 
light  and  shade  at  his  command. 

177.  To  take  a  single  instance.  You  know,  for  these  many 
years,  I  have  been  telling  our  architects  with  all  the  force  of 
voice  I  had  in  me,  that  they  could  design  nothing  until  they 
could  carve  natural  forms  rightly.  Many  imagine  that  work 
was  easy  ;  but  judge  for  yourselves  whether  it  be  or  not.  In 
Plate  XII.,  I  have  drawn,  with  approximate  accuracy,  a  cluster 
of  Phillyrea  leaves  as  they  grow.  Now,  if  we  wanted  to  cut 
them  in  bas-relief,  the  first  thing  we  should  have  to  consider 
would  be  the  position  of  their  outline  on  the  marble  ; — here 
it  is,  as  far  down  as  the  spring  of  the  leaves.  '  But  do  you 
suppose  that  is  what  an  ordinary  sculptor  could  either  lay  for 


s 

Ph 


-4 
H 
P5 

s 

Hi 
M 

w 

h 
o 

w 

-4 
« 


STRUCTURE. 


391 


his  first  sketch,  or  contemplate  as  a  limit  to  be  worked  clown 
to  ?  Then  consider  how  the  interlacing  and  springing  of  the 
leaves  can  be  expressed  within  this  outline.  It  must  be  done 
by  leaving  such  projection  in  the  marble  as  will  take  the  light 
in  the  same  proportion  as  the  drawing  does  ; — and  a  Floren- 
tine workman  could  do  it,  for  close  sight,  without  driving  one 
incision  deeper,  or  raising  a  single  surface  higher,  than  the 
eighth  of  an  inch.    Indeed,  no  sculptor  of  the  finest  time 


Fig.  9. 


would  design  such  a  complex  cluster  of  leaves  as  this,  except 
for  bronze  or  iron  work  ;  they  would  take  simpler  contours 
for  marble  ;  but  the  laws  of  treatment  would,  under  these 
conditions,  remain  just  as  strict  :  and  you  may,  perhaps,  be- 
lieve me  now  when  I  tell  you  that,  in  any  piece  of  fine  struct- 
ural sculpture  by  the  great  masters,  there  is  more  subtlety 
and  noble  obedience  to  lovely  laws  than  could  be  explained  to 
you  if  I  took  twenty  lectures  to  do  it  in,  instead  of  one. 

178.  There  remains  yet  a  point  of  mechanical  treatment,  on 
which  I  have  not  yet  touched  at  all  ;  nor  that  the  least  impor- 


392 


ARATRA  PENTELICL 


tant, — namely,  the  actual  method  and  style  of  handling.  A 
great  sculptor  uses  his  tools  exactly  as  a  painter  his  pencil, 
unci  you  may  recognize  the  decision  of  his  thought,  and  glow 
of  his  temper,  no  less  in  the  workmanship  than  the  design. 
The  modern  system  of  modelling  the  work  in  clay,  getting  it 
into  form  by  machinery,  and  by  the  hands  of  subordinates, 
and  touching  it  at  last,  if  indeed  the  (so  called)  sculptor  touch 
it  at  all,  only  to  correct  their  inefficiencies,  renders  the  pro- 
duction of  good  work  in  marble  a  physical  impossibility.  The 
first  result  of  it  is  that  the  sculptor  thinks  in  clay  instead  of 
marble,  and  loses  his  instinctive  sense  of  the  proper  treatment 
of  a  brittle  substance.  The  second  is  that  neither  he  nor  the 
public  recognize  the  touch  of  the  chisel  as  expressive  of  per- 
sonal feeling  or  power,  and  that  nothing  is  looked  for  except 
mechanical  polish. 

179.  The  perfectly  simple  piece  of  Greek  relief  represented 
in  Plate  XIII.,  will  enable  you  to  understand  at  once, — exam- 
ination of  the  original,  at  your  leisure,  will  prevent  you,  I 
trust,  from  ever  forgetting — what  is  meant  by  the  virtue  of 
handling  in  sculpture. 

The  projection  of  the  heads  of  the  four  horses,  one  behind 
the  other,  is  certainly  not  more,  altogether,  than  three-quarters 
of  an  inch  from  the  flat  ground,  and  the  one  in  front  does  not 
in  reality  project  more  than  the  one  behind  it,  yet,  by  mere 
drawing,*  you  see  the  sculptor  has  got  them  to  appear  to  re- 
cede in  due  order,  and  by  the  soft  rounding  of  the  flesh  sur- 
faces, and  modulation  of  the  veins,  he  has  taken  away  all  look 
of  flatness  from  the  necks.  He  has  drawn  the  eyes  and  nos- 
trils with  dark  incision,  careful  as  the  finest  touches  of  a 
painter's  pencil :  and  then,  at  last,  when  he  comes  to  the  manes, 
he  has  let  fly  hand  and  chisel  with  their  full  force,  and  where 
a  base  workman,  (above  all,  if  he  had  modelled  the  thing  in 
clay  first,)  would  have  lost  himself  in  laborious  imitation  of 
hair,  the  Greek  has  struck  the  tresses  out  with  angular  inci- 

*  This  plate  lias  been  executed  from  a  drawing  by  Mr.  Burgess,  in 
which  he  has  followed  the  curves  of  incision  with  exquisite  care,  and 
preserved  the  effect  of  the  surface  of  the  stone,  where  a  photograph 
would  have  lost  it  by  exaggerating  accidental  stains. 


STRUCTURE. 


393 


Bions,,  deep  driven,  every  one  in  appointed  place  and  deliberate 
curve,  yet  flowing  so  free  under  bis  noble  band  that  you  can- 
not alter,  without  harm,  the  bending  of  any  single  ridge,  nor 
contract,  nor  extend,  a  point  of  them.  And  if  you  will  look 
back  to  Plate  Dv.  you  will  see  the  difference  between  this  sharp 
incision,  used  to  express  horse-hair,  and  the  soft  incision  with 
intervening  rounded  ridge,  used  to  express  the  hair  of  Apollo 
Chrysocomes  ;  and,  beneath,  the  obliquely  ridged  incision  used 
to  express  the  plumes  of  his  swan  ;  in  both  these  cases  the 
handling  being  much  more  slow,  because  the  engraving  is  in 
metal ;  but  the  structural  importance  of  incision,  as  the  means 
of  effect,  never  lost  sight  of.  Finally,  here  are  two  actual  ex- 
amples of  the  work  in  marble  of  the  two  great  schools  of  the 
world  ;  one,  a  little  Fortune,  standing  tiptoe  on  the  globe  of 
the  Earth,  its  surface  traced  with  lines  in  hexagons  ;  not  cha- 
otic under  Fortune's  feet ;  Greek,  this,  and  by  a  trained  work- 
man ; — dug  up  in  the  temple  of  Neptune  at  Corfu  ; — and  here, 
a  Florentine  portrait-marble,  found  in  the  recent  alterations, 
face  downwards,  under  the  pavement  of  Sta  Maria  Novella  ;  * 
both  of  them  first-rate  of  their  kind  ;  and  both  of  them,  while 
exquisitely  finished  at  the  telling  points,  showing,  on  all  their 
unregarded  surfaces,  the  rough  furrow  of  the  fast-driven 
chisel,  as  distinctly  as  the  edge  of  a  common  paving-stone. 

180.  Let  me  suggest  to  you,  in  conclusion,  one  most  inter- 
esting point  of  mental  expression  in  these  necessary  aspects 
of  finely  executed  sculpture.  I  have  already  again  and  again 
pressed  on  your  attention  the  beginning  of  the  arts  of  men  in 
the  make  and  use  of  the  ploughshare.  Read  more  carefully 
— you  might  indeed  do  well  to  learn  at  once  by  heart, — the 
twenty-seven  lines  of  the  Fourth  Pythian,  which  describe  the 
ploughing  of  Jason.  There  is  nothing  grander  extant  in 
human  fancy,  nor  set  down  in  human  words :  but  this  great 
mythical  expression  of  the  conquest  of  the  earth-clay,  and 
brute-force,  by  vital  human  energy,  will  become  yet  more 
interesting  to  you  when  you  reflect  what  enchantment  has 
been  cut,  on  whiter  clay,  by  the  tracing  of  finer  furrows  ; — 

*  These  two  marbles  will  always,  henceforward,  be  sufficiently  ac- 
cessible for  reference  in  my  room  at  Corpus  Christi  College. 


394 


ARATRA  PENTELlri. 


what  the  delicate  and  consummate  arts  of  man  have  done  by 
the  ploughing  of  marble,  and  granite,  and  iron.  You  will 
learn  daily  more  and  more,  as  you  advance  in  actual  practice, 
how  the  primary  manual  art  of  engraving,  in  the  steadiness, 
clearness,  and  irrevocableness  of  it,  is  the  best  art- discipline 
that  can  be  given  either  to  mind  or  hand  ;  *  you  will  recog- 
nize one  law  of  right,  pronouncing  itself  in  the  well- resolved 
work  of  every  age  ;  you  will  see  the  ^firmly  traced  and  irrev- 
ocable incision  determining  not  only  the  forms,  but,  in  great 
part,  the  moral  temper,  of  all  vitally  progressive  art ;  you  w7ill 
trace  the  same  principle  and  power  in  the  furrows  which  the 
oblique  sun  showrs  on  the  granite  of  his  own  Egyptian  city, — 
in  the  white  scratch  of  the  stylus  through  the  colour  on  a 
Greek  vase — in  the  first  delineation,  on  the  wet  wall,  of  the 
groups  of  an  Italian  fresco  ;  in  the  unerring  and  unalterable 
touch  of  the  great  engraver  of  Nuremberg, — and  in  the  deep 
driven  and  deep  bitten  ravines  of  metal  by  which  Turner 
closed,  in  embossed  limits,  the  shadows  of  the  Liber  Studi- 
orum. 

Learn,  therefore,  in  its  full  extent,  the  force  of  the  great 
Greek  word,  xapao-o-o> ; — and,  give  me  pardon — if  you  think 
pardon  needed,  that  I  ask  you  also  to  learn  the  full  meaning 
of  the  English  word  derived  from  it.  Here,  at  the  Ford  of 
the  Oxen  of  Jason,  are  other  furrows  to  be  driven  than  these 
in  the  marble  of  Pentelicus.  The  fruitfullest,  or  the  fatallest 
of  all  ploughing  is  that  by  the  thoughts  of  your  youth,  on  the 
white  field  of  its  imagination.  For  by  these,  either  down  to 
the  disturbed  spirit,  "  KeKG7rTaL  kol  ^apdacrcTai  TreSoi/;"  or 
around  the  quiet  spirit,  and  on  all  the  laws  of  conduct  that 
hold  it,  as  a  fair  vase  its  frankincense,  are  ordained  the  pure 
colours,  and  engraved  the  just  Characters,  of  iEonian  life. 

*  That  it  was  also,  in  some  cases,  the  earliest  that  the  Greeks  gave, 
is  proved  by  LuciarTs  account  of  his  first  lesson  at  his  uncle's;  the 
eyitonevs,  literally  "in-cutter" — being  the  first  tool  put  into  his  hand, 
and  an  earthenware  tablet  to  cut  upon,  which  the  boy  pressing  too  hard, 
presently  breaks; — gets  beaten — goes  home  crying,  and  becomes,  after 
his  dream  above  quoted,  a  philosopher  instead  of  a  sculptor. 


THE  SCHOOL  OF  ATHENS. 


C05 


LECTURE  VI. 

THE  SCHOOL  OF  ATHENS. 

December,  1870. 

181.  It  can  scarcely  be  needful  for  me  to  tell  even  the  younger 
members  of  my  present  audience,  that  the  conditions  neces- 
sary for  the  production  of  a  perfect  school  of  sculpture  have 
only  twice  been  met  in  the  history  of  the  world,  and  then  for 
a  short  time  ;  nor  for  short  time  only,  but  also  in  narrow  dis- 
tricts, namely,  in  the  valleys  and  islands  of  Ionian  Greece,  and 
in  the  strip  of  land  deposited  by  the  Arno,  between  the  Apen- 
nine  crests  and  the  sea. 

All  other  schools,  except  these  two,  led  severally  by  Athens 
in  the  fifth  century  before  Christ,  and  by  Florence  in  the 
fifteenth  of  our  own  era,  are  imperfect  ;  and  the  best  of  them 
are  derivative  :  these  two  are  consummate  in  themselves,  and 
the  origin  of  what  is  best  in  others. 

182.  And  observe,  these  Athenian  and  Florentine  schools 
are  both  of  equal  rank,  as  essentially  original  and  independ- 
ent. The  Florentine,  being  subsequent  to  the  Greek,  bor- 
rowed much  from  it  ;  but  it  would  have  existed  just  as  strongly 
— and,  perhaps,  in  some  respects,  more  nobly — had  it  been 
the  first,  instead  of  the  latter  of  the  two.  The  task  set  to  each 
of  these  mightiest  of  the  nations  was,  indeed,  practically  the 
same,  and  as  hard  to  the  one  as  to  the  other.  The  Greeks 
found  Phoenician  and  Etruscan  art  monstrous,  and  had  to 
make  them  human.  The  Italians  found  Byzantine  and  Nor- 
man art  monstrous,  and  had  to  make  them  human.  The 
original  power  in  the  one  case  is  easily  traced  ;  in  the  other 
it  has  partly  to  be  unmasked,  because  the  change  at  Florence 
was,  in  many  points,  suggested  and  stimulated  by  the  former 
school.  But  we  mistake  in  supposing  that  Athens  taught 
Florence  the  laws  of  design  ;  she  taught  her,  in  reality,  only 
the  duty  of  truth. 

183.  You  remember  that  I  told  you  the  highest  art  could 


396 


An  ATE  A  PENTEL1CI. 


do  no  more  than  rightly  represent  the  human  form.  This  is 
the  simple  test,  then,  of  a  perfect  school, — that  it  has  repre- 
sented the  human  form,  so  that  it  is  impossible  to  conceive  of 
its  being  better  done.  And  that,  I  repeat,  has  been  accom- 
plished twice  only  :  once  in  Athens,  once  in  Florence.  And 
so  narrow  is  the  excellence  even  of  these  two  exclusive  schools, 
that  it  cannot  be  said  of  either  of  them  that  they  represented 
the  entire  human  form.  The  Greeks  perfectly  drew,  and  per- 
fectly moulded  the  body  and  limbs  ;  but  there  is,  so  far  as  I 
am  aware,  no  instance  of  their  representing  the  face  as  well 
as  any  great  Italian.  On  the  other  hand,  the  Italian  painted 
and  carved  the  face  insuperably  ;  but  I  believe  there  is  no  in- 
stance of  his  having  perfectly  represented  the  body,  which, 
by  command  of  his  religion,  it  became  his  pride  to  despise, 
and  his  safety  to  mortify. 

184.  The  general  course  of  your  study  here  renders  it  de- 
sirable that  you  should  be  accurately  acquainted  with  the  lead- 
ing principles  of  Greek  sculpture  ;  but  I  cannot  lay  these  be- 
fore you  without  giving  undue  prominence  to  some  of  the 
special  merits  of  that  school,  unless  I  previously  indicate  the 
relation  it  holds  to  the  more  advanced,  though  less  disciplined, 
excellence  of  Christian  art. 

In  this  and  the  last  lecture  of  the  present  course,*  I  shall 
endeavour,  therefore,  to  mass  for  you,  in  such  rude  and  dia- 
gram-like outline  as  may  be  possible  or  intelligible,  the  main 
characteristics  of  the  two  schools,  completing  and  correcting 
the  details  of  comparison  afterwards  ;  and  not  answering,  ob- 
serve, at  present,  for  any  generalization  I  give  you,  except  as  a 
ground  for  subsequent  closer  and  more  qualified  statements. 

And  in  carrying  out  this  parallel,  I  shall  sj3eak  indifferently 
of  works  of  sculpture,  and  of  the  modes  of  painting  which 

*  The  closing  Lecture,  on  the  religious  temper  of  the  Florentine, 
though  necessary  for  the  complete  explanation  of  the  subject  to  my 
class,  at  the  time,  introduced  new  points  of  inquiry  which  I  do  not 
choose  to  lay  before  the  general  reader  until  they  can  be  examined  in 
fuller  sequence.  The  present  volume,  therefore,  closes  with  the  Sixth 
Lecture,  and  that  on  Christian  art  will  be  given  as  the  first  of  the  pub- 
lished course  on  Florentine  Sculpture. 


THE  SCHOOL  OF  ATHENS. 


397 


propose  to  themselves  the  same  objects  as  sculpture.  And 
this  indeed  Florentine,  as  opposed  to  Venetian,  painting,  and 
that  of  Athens  in  the  fifth  century,  nearly  always  did. 

185.  I  begin,  therefore,  by  comparing  two  designs  of  the 
simplest  kind — engravings,  or,  at  least,  linear  drawings,  both  ; 
one  on  clay,  one  on  copper,  made  in  the  central  periods  of 
each  style,  and  representing  the  same  goddess — Aphrodite 
They  are  now  set  beside  each  other  in  your  Rudimentary 
Series.  The  first  is  from  a  patera  lately  found  at  Camirus, 
authoritatively  assigned  by  Mr.  Newton,  in  his  recent  catalogue, 
to  the  best  period  of  Greek  art.  The  second  is  from  one  of 
the  series  of  engravings  executed,  probably,  by  Baccio  Balclini, 
in  1485,  out  of  which  I  chose  your  first  practical  exercise — the 
Sceptre  of  Apollo.  I  cannot,  however,  make  the  comparison 
accurate  in  all  respects,  for  I  am  obliged  to  set  the  restricted 
type  of  the  Aphrodite  Urania  of  the  Greeks  beside  the  univer- 
sal Deity  conceived  by  the  Italian  as  governing  the  air,  earth, 
and  sea  ;  nevertheless  the  restriction  in  the  mind  of  the  Greek, 
and  expatiation  in  that  of  the  Florentine,  are  both  character- 
istic. The  Greek  Venus  Urania  is  flying  in  heaven,  her  power 
over  the  waters  symbolized  by  her  being  borne  by  a  swan,  and 
her  power  over  the  earth  by  a  single  flower  in  her  right  hand  ; 
but  the  Italian  Aphrodite  is  rising  out  of  the  actual  sea,  and 
only  half  risen  :  her  limbs  are  still  in  the  sea,  her  merely  ani- 
mal strength  filling  the  waters  with  their  life  ;  but  her  body 
to  the  loins  is  in  the  sunshine,  her  face  raised  to  the  sky  ;  her 
hand  is  about  to  lay  a  garland  of  flowers  on  the  earth. 

186.  The  Venus  Urania  of  the  Greeks,  in  her  relation  to 
men,  has  power  only  over  lawful  and  domestic  love  ;  there- 
fore, she  is  fully  dressed,  and  not  only  quite  dressed,  but  most 
daintily  and  trimly  :  her  feet  delicately  sandalled,  her  gown 
spotted  with  little  stars,  her  hair  brushed  exquisitely  smooth 
at  the  top  of  her  head,  trickling  in  minute  waves  down  her 
forehead  ;  and  though,  because  there's  such  a  quantity  of  it, 
she  can't  possibly  help  having  a  chignon,  look  how  tightly  she 
has  fastened  it  in  with  her  broad  fillet.  Of  course  she  is 
married,  so  she  must  wear  a  cap  with  pretty  minute  pendant 
jewels  at  the  border  ;  and  a  very  small  necklace,  all  that  her 


398 


AH  ATE  A  PENT  ELI  CI. 


husband  can  properly  afford,  just  enough  to  go  closely  round 
the  neck,  and  no  more.  On  the  contrary,  the  Aphrodite  of 
the  Italian,  being  universal  love,  is  pure-naked  ;  and  her  long 
hair  is  thrown  wild  to  the  wind  and  sea. 

These  primal  differences  in  the  symbolism,  observe,  are 
only  because  the  artists  are  thinking  of  separate  powers  : 
they  do  not  necessarily  involve  any  national  distinction  in 
feeling.  But  the  differences  I  have  next  to  indicate  are  es- 
sential, and  characterize  the  two  opposed  national  modes  of 
mind. 

187.  First,  and  chiefly.  The  Greek  Aphrodite  is  a  very 
pretty  person,  and  the  Italian  a  decidedly  plain  one.  That  is 
because  a  Greek  thought  no  one  could  possibly  love  any  but 
pretty  people  ;  but  an  Italian  thought  that  love  could  give 
dignity  to  the  meanest  form  that  it  inhabited,  and  light  to  the 
jDOorest  that  it  looked  upon.  So  his  Aphrodite  will  not  con- 
descend to  be  pretty. 

188.  Secondly.  In  the  Greek  Venus  the  breasts  are  broad 
and  full,  though  perfectly  severe  in  their  almost  conical  pro- 
file ; — (you  are  allowed  on  purpose  to  see  the  outline  of  the 
right  breast,  under  the  chiton  ;) — also  the  right  arm  is  left  bare, 
and  you  can  just  see  the  contour  of  the  front  of  the  right 
limb  and  knee  ;  both  arm  and  limb  pure  and  firm,  but  lovely. 
The  plant  she  holds  in  her  hand  is  a  branching  and  flowering 
one,  the  seed  vessel  prominent.  These  signs  all  mean  that 
her  essential  function  is  child-bearing. 

On  the  contrary,  in  the  Italian  Venus  the  breasts  are  so 
small  as  to  be  scarcely  traceable  ;  the  body  strong,  and  almost 
masculine  in  its  angles  ;  the  arms  meagre  and  unattractive, 
and  she  lays  a  decorative  garland  of  flowers  on  the  earth. 
These  signs  mean  that  the  Italian  thought  of  love  as  the 
strength  of  an  eternal  spirit,  for  ever  helpful ;  and  for  ever 
crowned  with  flowers,  that  neither  know  seed-time  nor  har- 
vest, and  bloom  where  there  is  neither  death,  nor  birth. 

189.  Thirdly.  The  Greek  Aphrodite  is  entirely  calm,  and 
looks  straight  forward.  Not  one  feature  of  her  face  is  dis- 
turbed, or  seems  ever  to  have  been  subject  to  emotion.  The 
Italian  Aphrodite  looks  up,  her  face  all  quivering  and  burning 


THE  SCHOOL  OF  ATHENS. 


399 


with  passion  and  wasting  anxiety.  The  Greek  one  is  quiet, 
self-possessed,  and  self-satisfied  ;  the  Italian  incapable  of  rest ; 
she  has  had  no  thought  nor  care  for  herself ;  her  hair  has 
been  bound  by  a  fillet  like  the  Greeks  ;  but  it  is  now  all  fallen 
loose,  and  clotted  with  the  sea,  or  clinging  to  her  body  ;  only 
the  front  tress  of  it  is  caught  by  the  breeze  from  her  raised 
forehead,  and  lifted,  in  the  place  where  the  tongues  of  fire 
rest  on  the  brows,  in  the  early  Christian  pictures  of  Pentecost, 
and  the  waving  fires  abide  upon  the  heads  of  Angelico's  ser- 
aphim. 

190.  There  are  almost  endless  points  of  interest,  great  and 
small,  to  be  noted  in  these  differences  of  treatment.  This 
binding  of  the  hair  by  the  single  fillet  marks  the  straight 
course  of  one  great  system  of  art  method,  from  that  Greek 
head  which  I  showed  you  on  the  archaic  coin  of  the  seventh 
century  before  Christ,  to  this  of  the  fifteenth  of  our  own  era 
— nay,  when  you  look  close,  you  will  see  the  entire  action  of 
the  head  depends  on  one  lock  of  hair  falling  back  from  the 
ear,  which  it  does  in  compliance  with  the  old  Greek  observance 
of  its  being  bent  there  by  the  pressure  of  the  helmet.  That 
rippling  of  it  down  her  shoulders  comes  from  the  Athena  of 
of  Corinth  ;  the  raising  of  it  on  her  forehead,  from  the  knot 
of  the  hair  of  Diana,  changed  into  the  vestal  fire  of  the  angels. 
But  chiefly,  the  calmness  of  the  features  in  the  one  face,  and 
their  anxiety  in  the  other,  indicate  first,  indeed,  the  character- 
istic difference  in  every  conception  of  the  schools,  the  Greek 
never  representing  expression,  the  Italian  primarily  seeking 
it ;  but  far  more,  mark  for  us  here  the  utter  change  in  the 
conception  of  love  ;  from  the  tranquil  guide  and  queen  of  a 
happy  terrestrial  domestic  life,  accepting  its  immediate 
pleasures  and  natural  duties,  to  the  agonizing  hope  of  an  in- 
finite good,  and  the  ever  mingled  joy  and  terror  of  a  love  di- 
vine in  jealousy,  crying,  "  Set  me  as.  a  seal  upon  thine  heart, 
as  a  seal  upon  thine  arm  ;  for  love  is  strong  as  death,  jealousy 
is  cruel  as  the  grave." 

The  vast  issues  dependent  on  this  change  in  the  conception 
of  the  ruling  passion  of  the  human  soul,  I  will  endeavour  to 
show  you,  on  a  future  occasion  :  in  my  present  lecture,  I 


400 


ARATRA  RENTE L1C L 


shall  limit  myself  to  the  definition  of  the  temper  of  Greek 
sculpture,  and  of  its  distinctions  from  Florentine  in  the  treat- 
ment of  any  subject  whatever,  be  it  love  or  hatred,  hope  or 
despair. 

These  great  differences  are  mainly  the  following. 

191.  1.  A  Greek  never  expresses  momentary  passion  ;  a 
Florentine  looks  to  momentary  passion  as  the  ultimate  object 
of  his  skill. 

When  you  are  next  in  London,  look  carefully  in  the  British 
Museum  at  the  casts  from  the  statues  in  the  pediment  of  the 
Temple  of  Minerva  at  iEgina.  You  have  there  Greek  work  of 
definite  date  ; — about  600  b.c,  certainly  before  580 — of  the 
purest  kind  ;  and  you  have  the  representation  of  a  noble  ideal 
subject,  the  combats  of  the  iEaeidse  at  Troy,  with  Athena  her- 
self looking  on.  But  there  is  no  attempt  whatever  to  repre- 
sent expression  in  the  features,  none  to  give  complexity  of 
action  or  gesture  ;  there  is  no  struggling,  no  anxiety,  no  visi- 
ble temporary  exertion  of  muscles.  There  are  fallen  figures, 
one  pulling  a  lance  out  of  his  wound,  and  others  in  attitudes 
of  attack  and  defence  ;  several  kneeling  to  draw  their  bows. 
But  all  inflict  and  suffer,  conquer  or  expire,  with  the  same 
smile. 

192.  Plate  XIV.  gives  you  examples,  from  more  advanced 
art,  of  true  Greek  representation  ;  the  subjects  being  the  two 
contests  of  leading  import  to  the  Greek  heart — that  of  Apollo 
with  the  Python,  and  of  Hercules  with  the  NemeanLion.  You 
see  that  in  neither  case  is  there  the  slightest  effort  to  repre- 
sent the  Xvacra,  or  agony  of  contest.  No  good  Greek  artist 
would  have  you  behold  the  suffering,  either  of  gods,  heroes, 
or  men  ;  nor  allow  you  to  be  apprehensive  of  the  issue  of  their 
contest  with  evil  beasts,  or  evil  spirits.  All  such  lower 
sources  of  excitement  are  to  be  closed  to  you  ;  your  interest 
is  to  be  in  the  thoughts*  involved  by  the  fact  of  the  war ;  and 
in  the  beauty  or  lightness  of  form,  whether  active  or  in- 
active. I  have  to  work  out  this  subject  with  you  afterwards, 
and  to  compare  with  the  pure  Greek  method  of  thought,  that 
of  modern  dramatic  passion,  engrafted  on  it,  as  typically  in 
Turner's  contest  of  Apollo  and  the  Python  :  in  the  meantime, 


Plate  XIV. — Apollo  and  the  Python. 
Heracles  and  the  Nemean  Lion. 


Plate  XV.— Hera  of  Argos.    Zeus  of  Syracuse. 


THE  SCHOOL  OF  ATHENS. 


be  content  with  the  statement  of  this  first  great  principle-— 
that  a  Greek,  as  such,  never  expresses  momentary  j^assion. 

193.  Secondly.  The  Greek,  as  such,  never  expresses  per- 
sonal character,  while  a  Florentine  holds  it  to  be  the  ultimate 
condition  of  beauty.  You  are  startled,  I  suppose,  at  my 
saying  this,  having  had  it  often  pointed  out  to  you,  as  a  tran- 
scendent piece  of  subtlety  in  Greek  art,  that  you  could  dis- 
tinguish Hercules  from  Apollo  by  his  being  stout,  and  Diana 
from  Juno  by  her  being  slender.  That  is  very  true  ;  but  those 
are  general  distinctions  of  class,  not  special  distinctions  of 
personal  character.  Even  as  general,  they  are  bodily,  not 
mental.  They  are  the  distinctions,  in  fleshly  aspect,  between 
an  athlete  and  a  musician, — between  a  matron  and  a  huntress  ; 
but  in  no  wise  distinguish  the  simple-hearted  hero  from  the 
subtle  Master  of  the  Muses,  nor  the  wilful  and  fitful  girl- 
goddess  from  the  cruel  and  resolute  matron-goddess.  But 
judge  for  yourselves ; — In  the  successive  plates,  XY. — XVIII.,  I 
show  you,*  typically  represented  as  the  protectresses  of  nations, 
the  Argive,  Cretan,  and  Lacinian  Hera,  the  Messenian  Demeter, 
the  Athena  of  Corinth,  the  Artemis  of  Syracuse,  the  fountain 
Arethusa  of  Syracuse,  and  the  Sirem  Ligeia  of  Terina.  Now, 
of  these  heads,  it  is  true  that  some  are  more  delicate  in  feature 
than  the  rest,  and  some  softer  in  expression  :  in  other  respects, 
can  you  trace  any  distinction  between  the  Goddesses  of  Earth 
and  Heaven,  or  between  the  Goddess  of  Wisdom  and  the  Water 
Nymph  of  Syracuse  ?  So  little  can  you  do  so,  that  it  would  have 
remained  a  disputed  question — had  not  the  name  luckily  been 
inscribed  on  some  Syracusan  coins — whether  the  head  upon 
them  was  meant  for  Arethusa  at  all ;  and,  continually,  it  becomes 
a  question  respecting  finished  statues,  if  without  attributes,  "Is 
this  Bacchus  or  Apollo — Zeus  or  Poseidon  ?  "  There  is  a  fact  for 
you  ;  noteworthy,  I  think  !    There  is  no  personal  character  in 

*  These  plates  of  coins  are  given  for  future  reference  and  examina- 
tion, not  merely  for  the  use  made  of  them  in  this  place.  The  Lacinian 
Hera,  if  a  coin  could  be  found  unworn  in  surface,  would  be  very  noble  ; 
her  hair  is  thrown  free  because  she  is  the  goddess  of  the  cape  of  storms, 
though  in  her  temple,  there,  the  wind  never  moved  the  ashes  oj?  its 
iltar.    (Livy,  xxiv.  3.) 


402 


All  AT R  A  PENTELICL 


true  Greek  art : — abstract  ideas  of  youth  and  age,  strength 
and  swiftness,  virtue  and  vice, — yes  :  but  there  is  no  individu- 
ality ;  and  the  negative  holds  down  to  the  revived  conven- 
tionalism of  the  Greek  school  by  Leonardo,  when  he  tells  you 
how  you  are  to  paint  young  women,  and  how  old  ones  ;  though 
a  Greek  would  hardly  have  been  so  discourteous  to  age  as  the 
Italian  is  in  his  canon  of  it, — "  old  women  should  be  repre- 
sented as  passionate  and  hasty,  after  the  manner  of  Infernal 
Furies." 

194.  "  But  at  least,  if  the  Greeks  do  not  give  character,  they 
give  ideal  beauty  ?  "  So  it  is  said,  without  contradiction.  But 
will  you  look  again  at  the  series  of  coins  of  the  best  time  of 
Greek  art,  which  I  have  just  set  before  you  ?  Are  any  of  these 
goddesses  or  nymphs  very  beautiful?  Certainly  the  Junos 
are  not.  Certainly  the  Demeters  are  not.  The  Siren,  and 
Arethusa,  have  well-formed  and  regular  features ;  but  I  am 
quite  sure  that  if  you  look  at  them  without  prejudice,  you  will 
think  neither  reach  even  the  average  standard  of  pretty  Eng- 
lish girls.  The  Venus  Urania  suggests  at  first,  the  idea  of  a 
very  charming  person,  but  you  will  find  there  is  no  real  depth 
nor  sweetness  in  the  contours,  looked  at  closely.  And  re- 
member, these  are  chosen  examples ;  the  best  I  can  find  of 
art  current  in  Greece  at  the  great  time  ;  and  if  even  I  were  to 
take  the  celebrated  statues,  of  which  only  two  or  three  are 
extant,  not  one  of  them  excels  the  Venus  of  Melos ;  and  she, 
as  I  have  already  asserted,  in  The  Queen  of  the  Air,  has  noth- 
ing notable  in  feature  except  dignity  and  simplicity.  Of  Athena 
I  do  not  know  one  authentic  type  of  great  beauty  ;  but  the 
intense  ugliness  which  the  Greeks  could  tolerate  in  their  sym- 
bolism of  her  will  be  convincingly  proved  to  you  by  the  coin 
represented  in  Plate  VI.  You  need  only  look  at  two  or  three 
vases  of  the  best  time,  to  assure  yourselves  that  beauty  of 
feature  wTas,  in  popular  art,  not  only  unattained,  but  unat- 
tempted  ;  and  finally, — and  this  you  may  accept  as  a  conclusive 
proof  of  the  Greek  insensitiveness  to  the  most  subtle  beauty — 
there  is  little  evidence  even  in  their  literature,  and  none  in 
their  art,  of  their  having  ever  perceived  any  beauty  in  infancy 
or  early  childhood. 


Plate  XVI.— Demeter  of  Messene.   Hera  of  Crossus. 


\ 


Plate  XVII. — Athena  of  Thurium. 
Sereie  Ligeia  of  Terina 


THE  SCHOOL  OF  ATHENS. 


403 


195.  The  Greeks,  then,  do  not  give  passion,  do  not  give 
character,  do  not  give  refined  or  naive  beauty.  But  you  may 
think  that  the  absence  of  these  is  intended  to  give  dignity  to 
the  gods  and  nymphs ;  and  that  their  calm  faces  would  be 
found,  if  you  long  observed  them,  instinct  with  some  expres- 
sion of  divine  mystery  or  power. 

I  will  convince  you  of  the  narrow  range  of  Greek  thought 
in  these  respects,  by  showing  you,  from  the  two  sides  of  one 
and  the  same  coin,  images  of  the  most  mysterious  of  their 
Deities,  and  the  most  powerful, — Demeter  and  Zeus. 

Remember,  that  just  as  the  west  coasts  of  Ireland  and  Eng- 
land catch  first  on  their  hills  the  rain  of  the  Atlantic,  so  the 
western  Peloponnese  arrests,  in  the  clouds  of  the  first  moun- 
tain ranges  of  Arcadia,  the  moisture  of  the  Mediterranean  ; 
and  over  all  the  plains  of  Elis,  Pylos,  and  Messene,  the  strength 
and  sustenance  of  men  was  naturally  felt  to  be  granted  by 
Zeus  ;  as,  on  the  east  coast  of  Greece,  the  greater  clearness  of 
the  air  by  the  power  of  Athena.  If  you  will  recollect  the 
prayer  of  Rhea,  in  the  single  line  of  Callimachus — "Tola 
TeK€  kolL  <tv-  real  8'  wSlv€<;  eAcu^pai,"  (compare  Pausanias  iv.  33, 
at  the  beginning,) — it  will  mark  for  you  the  connection,  in  the 
Greek  mind,  of  the  birth  of  the  mountain  springs  of  Arcadia 
with  the  birth  of  Zeus.  And  the  centres  of  Greek  thought  on 
this  western  coast  are  necessarily  Elis,  and,  (after  the  time  of 
Epaminondas,)  Messene. 

19G.  I  show  you  the  coin  of  Messene,  because  the  splendid 
height  and  form  of  Mount  Ithome  were  more  expressive  of 
11  le  physical  power  of  Zeus  than  the  lower  hills  of  Olympia  ; 
and  also  because  it  was  struck  just  at  the  time  of  the  most 
finished  and  delicate  Greek  art — a  little  after  the  main 
strength  of  Phidias,  but  before  decadence  had  generally  pro- 
nounced itself.  The  coin  is  a  silver  didrachm,  bearing  on 
one  side  a  head  of  Demeter  (Plate  XVI,  at  the  top);  on  the 
other  a  full  figure  of  Zeus  Aietophoros  (Plate  XIX.,  at  the 
top)  ;  the  two  together  signifying  the  sustaining  strength  of 
the  earth  and  heaven.  Look  first  at  the  head  of  Demeter.  It 
is  merely  meant  to  personify  fulness  of  harvest :  there  is  no 
mystery  in  it,  no  sadness,  no  vestige  of  the  expression  which 


404 


ABATE  A  PENTELICL 


we  should  have  looked  for  in  any  effort  to  reaHze  the  Greek 
thoughts  of  the  Earth  Mother,  as  we  find  them  spoken  by  the 
poets.  But  take  it  merely  as  personified  abundance  ; — the 
goddess  of  black  furrow  and  tawny  grass — how  commonplace 
it  is,  and  how  poor !  The  hair  is  grand,  and  there  is  one 
stalk  of  wheat  set  in  it,  which  is  enough  to  indicate  the  god- 
dess who  is  meant ;  but,  in  that  very  office,  ignoble,  for  it  shows 
that  the  artist  could  only  inform  you  that  this  was  Demeter 
by  such  a  symbol.  How  easy  it  would  have  been  for  a  great 
designer  to  have  made  the  hair  lovely  with  fruitful  flowers, 
and  the  features  noble  in  mystery  of  gloom,  or  of  tenderness. 
But  here  you  have  nothing  to  interest  you,  except  the  com- 
mon Greek  perfections  of  a  straight  nose  and  a  full  chin. 

197.  We  pass,  on  the  reverse  of  the  die,  to  the  figure  of 
Zeus  Aietophoros.  Think  of  the  invocation  to  Zeus  in  the 
Suppliants,  (525),  "King  of  Kings,  and  Happiest  of  the 
Happy,  Perfectest  of  the  Perfect  in  strength,  abounding  in 
all  things,  Jove — hear  us  and  be  with  us  ; "  and  then,  consider 
wrhat  strange  phase  of  mind  it  was,  which,  under  the  very 
mountain-home  of  the  god,  was  content  with  this  symbol  of 
him  as  a  wTell-fed  athlete,  holding  a  diminutive  and  crouching 
eagle  on  his  fist.  The  features  and  the  right  hand  have  been 
injured  in  this  coin,  but  the  action  of  the  arms  shows  that  it 
held  a  thunderbolt,  of  which,  I  believe,  the  twisted  rays  were 
triple.  In  the,  presumably  earlier,  coin  engraved  by  Mil- 
lingen,  however,*  it  is  singly  pointed  only  ;  and  the  added 
inscription  "I012M,"  in  the  field,  renders  the  conjecture  of 
Millingen  probable,  that  this  is  a  rude  representation  of  the 
statue  of  Zeus  Ithomates,  made  by  Ageladas,  the  master  of 
Phidias ;  and  I  think  it  has,  indeed,  the  aspect  of  the  endeav- 
our, by  a  workman  of  more  advanced  knowledge,  and  more 
vulgar  temper,  to  put  the  softer  anatomy  of  later  schools 
into  the  simple  action  of  an  archaic  figure.  Be  that  as  it 
may,  here  is  one  of  the  most  refined  cities  of  Greece  content 
with  the  figure  of  an  athlete  as  the  representative  of  their 
own  mountain  god  ;  marked  as  a  divine  power  merely  by  the 
attributes  of  the  eagle  and  thunderbolt. 

*  Ancient  Cities  and  Kings,  Plate  IV.    No.  20. 


Plate  XVIII. — Artemis  of  Syracuse. 
Hera  of  Lacinian  Cape. 


Plate  XIX.— Zeus  of  Messene.    Ajax  of  Opus. 


THE  SCHOOL  OF  ATHENS. 


405 


198.  Lastly.  The  Greeks  have  not,  it  appears,  in  any 
supreme  way,  given  to  their  statues  character,  beauty,  or 
divine  strength.  Can  they  give  divine  sadness  ?  Shall  we 
find  in  their  artwork  any  of  that  pensiveness  and  yearning 
for  the  dead,  which  fills  the  chants  of  their  tragedy  ?  I  sup- 
pose if  anything  like  nearness  or  firmness  of  faith  in  after- 
life  is  to  be  found  in  Greek  legend,  you  might  look  for  it  in 
the  stories  about  the  Island  of  Leuce,  at  the  mouth  of  the 
Danube,  inhabited  by  the  ghosts  of  Achilles,  Patroclus,  Ajax 
the  son  of  O'ileus,  and  Helen  ;  and  in  which  the  pavement  of 
the  Temple  of  Achilles  was  washed  daily  by  the  sea-birds 
with  their  wings,  dipping  them  in  the  sea. 

Now  it  happens  that  we  have  actually  on  a  coin  of  the 
Locrians  the  representation  of  the  ghost  of  the  Lesser  Ajax. 
There  is  nothing  in  the  history  of  human  imagination  more 
lovely,  than  their  leaving  always  a  place  for  his  spirit,  vacant 
in  their  ranks  of  battle.  But  here  is  their  sculptural  repre- 
sentation of  the  phantom  ;  (lower  figure,  Plate  XIX. ),  and  I 
think  you  will  at  once  agree  with  me  in  feeling  that  it  would  be 
impossible  to  conceive  anything  more  completely  unspiritual. 
You  might  more  than  doubt  that  it  could  have  been  meant  for 
the  departed  soul,  unless  you  were  aware  of  the  meaning  of 
this  little  circlet  between  the  feet.  On  other  coins  you  find  his 
name  inscribed  there,  but  in  this  you  have  his  habitation, 
the  haunted  Island  of  Leuce  itself,  with  the  waves  flowing 
round  it. 

199.  Again  and  again,  however,  I  have  to  remind  you, 
with  respect  to  these  apparently  frank  and  simple  failures, 
that  the  Greek  always  intends  you  to  think  for  yourself,  and 
understand,  more  than  he  can  speak.  Take  this  instance  at 
our  hands,  the  trim  little  circlet  for  the  Island  of  Leuce. 
The  workman  knows  very  well  it  is  not  like  the  island,  and 
that  he  could  not  make  it  so  ;  that  at  its  best,  his  sculpture 
can  be  little  more  than  a  letter  ;  and  yet,  in  putting  this  cir- 
clet, and  its  encompassing  fretwork  of  minute  waves,  he  does 
more  than  if  he  had  merely  given  you  a  letter  L,  or  written 
"  Leuce."  If  you  know  anything  of  beaches  and  sea,  this 
symbol  will  set  your  imagination  at  work  in  recalling  them ; 


406 


ARATRA  PENTELICL 


then  you  will  think  of  the  temple  service  of  the  novitiate  sea- 
birds,  and  of  the  ghosts  of  Achilles  and  Patroclus  appearing, 
like  the  Dioscuri,  above  the  storm-clouds  of  the  Euxine.  And 
the  artist,  throughout  his  work,  never  for  an  instant  loses 
faith  in  your  sympathy  and  passion  being  ready  to  answer  his  ; 
— if  you  have  none  to  give,  he  does  not  care  to  take  you  into 
his  counsel ;  on  the  whole,  would  rather  that  you  should  not 
look  at  his  work. 

200.  But  if  you  have  this  sympathy  to  give,  you  may  be 
sure  that  whatever  he  does  for  you  will  be  right,  as  far  as  he 
can  render  it  so.  It  may  not  be  sublime,  nor  beautiful,  nor 
amusing  ;  but  it  will  be  full  of  meaning,  and  faithful  in  guid- 
ance. He  will  give  you  clue  to  myriads  of  things  that  he  can- 
not literally  teach  ;  and,  so  far  as  he  does  teach,  you  may  trust 
him.    Is  not  this  saying  much  ? 

And  as  he  strove  only  to  teach  what  was  true,  so,  in  his 
sculptured  symbol,  he  strove  only  to  carve  what  was — Eight. 
He  rules  over  the  arts  to  this  day.  and  will  for  ever,  because 
he  sought  not  first  for  beauty,  nor  first  for  passion,  or  for  inven- 
tion, but  for  Eightness  ;  striving  to  display,  neither  himself 
nor  his  art,  but  the  thing  that  he  dealt  with,  in  its  simplicity. 
That  is  his  specific  character  as  a  Greek.  Of  course,  every 
nation's  character  is  connected  with  that  of  others  surround- 
ing or  preceding  it ;  and  in  the  best  Greek  work  you  will  find 
some  things  that  are  still  false,  or  fanciful  ;  but  whatever  in  it 
is  false  or  fanciful,  is  not  the  Greek  part  of  it — it  is  the 
Phoenician,  or  Egyptian,  or  Pelasgian  part.  The  essential  Hel- 
lenic stamp  is  veracity  : — Eastern  nations  drew  their  heroes 
with  eight  legs,  but  the  Greeks  drew  them  with  two  ; — Egyp- 
tians drew  their  deities  with  cats'  heads,  bnt  the  Greeks  drew 
them  with  men's  ;  and  out  of  all  fallacy,  disproportion,  and 
indefiniteness,  they  were,  day  by  day,  resolvedly  withdraw- 
ing and  exalting  themselves  into  restricted  and  demonstrable 
truth. 

201.  And  now,  having  cut  away  the  misconceptions  which 
encumbered  our  thoughts,  I  shall  be  able  to  put  the  Greek 
school  into  some  clearness  of  its  position  for  you,  with  respect 
to  the  art  of  the  world.    That  relation  is  strangely  duplicate ; 


THE  SCHOOL  OF  ATHENS. 


407 


for  on  one  side,  Greek  art  is  the  root  of  all  simplicity  ;  and  on 
the  other,  of  all  complexity. 

On  one  side  I  say,  it  is  the  root  of  all  simplicity.  If  you 
■were  for  some  prolonged  period  to  study  Greek  sculpture  ex- 
clusively in  the  Elgin  Room  of  the  British  Museum,  and  were 
then  suddenly  transported  to  the  Hotel  de  Cluny,  or  any 
other  museum  of  Gothic  and  barbarian  workmanship,  you 
would  imagine  the  Greeks  were  the  masters  of  all  that  was 
grand,  simple,  wise,  and  tenderly  human,  opposed  to  the  pet- 
tiness of  the  toys  of  the  rest  of  mankind. 

202.  On  one  side  of  their  work  they  are  so.  From  all  vain 
and  mean  decoration — all  weak  and  monstrous  error,  the 
Greeks  rescue  the  forms  of  man  and  beast,  and  sculpture 
them  in  the  nakedness  of  their  true  flesh,  and  with  the  lire 
of  their  living  soul.  Distinctively  from  other  races,  as  I  have 
now,  perhaps  to  your  weariness,  told  you,  this  is  the  work  of 
the  Greek,  to  give  health  to  what  was  diseased,  and  chastise- 
ment to  what  was  untrue.  So  far  as  this  is  found  in  any  other 
school,  hereafter,  it  belongs  to  them  by  inheritance  from  the 
Greeks,  or  invests  them  with  the  brotherhood  of  the  Greek. 
And  this  is  the  deep  meaning  of  the  myth  of  Daedalus  as  the 
giver  of  motion  to  statues.  The  literal  change  from  the  bind- 
ing together  of  the  feet  to  their  separation,  and  the  other 
modifications  of  action  which  took  place,  either  in  progressive 
skill,  or  often,  as  the  mere  consequence  of  the  transition  from 
wood  to  stone,  (a  figure  carved  out  of  one  wooden  log  must 
have  necessarily  its  feet  near  each  other,  and  hands  at  its 
sides),  these  literal  changes  are  as  nothing,  in  the  Greek  fable, 
compared  to  the  bestowing  of  apparent  life.  The  figures  of 
monstrous  gods  on  Indian  temples  have  their  legs  separate 
enough  ;  but  they  are  infinitely  more  dead  than  the  rude  fig- 
ures at  Branchida3  sitting  with  their  hands  on  their  knees. 
And,  briefly,  the  work  of  Daedalus  is  the  giving  of  deceptive 
life,  as  that  of  Prometheus  the  giving  of  real  life  ;  and  I  can 
put  the  relation  of  Greek  to  all  other  art,  in  this  function,  be- 
fore you  in  easily  compared  and  remembered  examples. 

203.  Here,  on  the  right,  in  Plate  XX.,  is  an  Indian  bull, 
colossal,  and  elaborately   carved,  which  you  may  take  as  a 


408 


ARATHA  PENTBLICI. 


sufficient  type  of  the  bad  art  of  all  the  earth.  False  in  form, 
dead  in  heart,  and  loaded  with  wealth,  externally.  We  will 
not  ask  the  date  of  this  ;  it  may  rest  in  the  eternal  obscurity 
of  evil  art,  everywhere,  and  for  ever.  Now,  besides  this  colos- 
sal bull,  here  is  a  bit  of  Daedalus  work,  enlarged  from  a  coin 
not  bigger  than  a  shilling  :  look  at  the  two  together,  and  you 
ought  to  know,  henceforward,  what  Greek  art  means,  to  the 
end  of  your  days. 

20  L  In  this  aspect  of  it  then,  I  say,  it  is  the  simplest  and 
naked  est  of  lovely  veracities.  But  it  has  another  aspect,  or 
rather  another  pole,  for  the  opposition  is  diametric.  As  the 
simplest,  so  also  it  is  the  most  complex  of  human  art.  I  told 
you  in  my  fifth  Lecture,  showing  you  the  spotty  picture  of 
Velasquez,  that  an  essential  Greek  character  is  a  liking  for 
things  that  are  dappled.  And  you  cannot  but  have  noticed 
how  often  and  how  prevalently  the  idea  which  gave  its  name 
to  the  Porch  of  Polygnotus,  (C  arod  ir  oikLX-q"  occurs  to  the 
Greeks  as  connected  with  the  finest  art.  Thus,  when  the  lux- 
urious city  is  opposed  to  the  simple  and  healthful  one,  in  the 
second  book  of  Plato's  Polity,  you  find  that,  next  to  perfumes, 
pretty  ladies,  and  dice,  you  must  have  in  it  "  Trot/aXta,"  which 
observe,  both  in  that  place  and  again  in  the  third  book,  is  the 
separate  art  of  joiners'  work,  or  inlaying  ;  but  the  idea  of  ex- 
quisitely divided  variegation  or  division,  both  in  sight  and 
sound — the  "ravishing  division  to  the  lute,"  as  in  Pindar's 
"  ttolklXol  vfxvoL 1 ' — runs  through  the  compass  of  all  Greek  art- 
description  ;  and  if,  instead  of  studying  that  art  among  marbles, 
you  were  to  look  at  it  only  on  vases  of  a  fine  time,  (look  back, 
for  instance,  to  Plate  IV.  here),  your  impression  of  it  would 
be,  instead  of  breadth  and  simplicity,  one  of  universal  spot- 
tiness and  chequeredness,  "  £v  dyyeW  f'E(o/<eo-u/  -n-cLfATroudkois ;  " 
and  of  the  artist's  delighting  in  nothing  so  much  as  in  crossed 
or  starred  or  spotted  things  ;  which,  in  right  places,  he  and 
his  public  both  do  unlimitedly.  Indeed  they  hold  it  compli- 
mentary even  to  a  trout,  to  call  him  a  "  spotty."  Do  you 
recollect  the  trout  in  the  tributaries  of  the  Ladon,  which 
Pausanias  says  were  spotted,  so  that  they  were  like  thrushes, 
and  which,  the  Arcadians  told  him,  could  speak  ?    In  this  last 


Plate  XXI. — The  Beginnings  of  Chivalry. 


THE  SCHOOL  OF  ATHENS. 


409 


7rciKiAta,  however,  they  disappointed  him.  "I,  indeed,  saw 
some  of  them  caught,"  he  says,  "but  I  did  not  hear  any  of 
them  speak,  though  I  waited  beside  the  river  till  sunset." 

205.  I  must  sum  roughly  now,  for  I  have  detained  you  too 
long. 

The  Greeks  have  been  thus  the  origin  not  only  of  all  broad, 
mighty,  and  calm  conception,  but  of  all  that  is  divided,  deli- 
cate, and  tremulous ;  "  variable  as  the  shade,  by  the  light 
quivering  aspen  made."  To  them,  as  first  leaders  of  orna- 
mental design,  belongs,  of  right,  the  praise  of  glistenings  in 
gold,  piercings  in  ivory,  stainings  in  purple,  burnishings 
in  dark  blue  steel ;  of  the  fantasy  of  the  Arabian  roof 
— quartering  of  the  Christian  shield, — rubric  and  arabesque 
of  Christian  scripture ;  in  fine,  all  enlargement,  and  all 
diminution  of  adorning  thought,  from  the  temple  to  the 
toy,  and  from  the  mountainous  pillars  of  Agrigentum 
to  the  last  fineness  of  fretwork  in  the  Pisan  Chapel  of  the 
Thorn. 

And  in  their  doing  all  this,  they  stand  as  masters  of  human 
order  and  justice,  subduing  the  animal  nature  guided  by  the 
spiritual  one,  as  you  see  the  Sicilian  Charioteer  stands,  hold- 
ing his  horse-reins,  with  the  wild  lion  racing  beneath  him,  and 
the  flying  angel  above,  on  the  beautiful  coin  of  early  Syracuse ; 
(lowest  in  Plate  XXL). 

And  the  beginnings  of  Christian  chivalary  were  in  that 
Greek  bridling  of  the  dark  and  the  white  horses. 

208.  Not  that  a  Greek  never  made  mistakes.  He  made  as 
many  as  we  do  ourselves,  nearly  ; — he  died  of  his  mistakes  at 
last — as  we  shall  die  of  them ;  but  so  far  he  was  separated 
from  the  herd  of  more  mistaken  and  more  wretched  nations 
—so  far  as  he  was  Greek — it  was  by  his  rightness.  He  lived, 
and  worked,  and  was  satisfied  with  the  fatness  of  his  land,  and 
the  fame  of  his  deeds,  by  his  justice,  and  reason,  and  modesty. 
He  became  Grceculus  esuriens,  little,  and  hungry,  and  every 
man's  errand-boy,  by  his  iniquity,  and  his  competition,  and 
his  love  of  talk.  But  his  Graecism  was  in  having  done,  at  least 
at  one  period  of  his  dominion,  more  than  anybody  else,  what 
was  modest,  useful,  and  eternally  true  ;  and  as  a  workman,  he 


410 


ABA  TEA  PENTELIGL 


verily  did,  or  first  suggested  the  doing  of,  everything  possible 
to  man. 

Take  Daedalus,  his  great  type  of  the  practically  executive 
craftsman,  and  the  inventor  of  expedients  in  craftsmanship, 
(as  distinguished  from  Prometheus,  the  institutor  of  moral 
order  in  art).    Daedalus  invents, — he,  or  his  nephew, — 

The  potter's  wheel,  and  all  work  in  clay  ; 

The  saw,  and  all  work  in  wood ; 

The  masts  and  sails  of  ships,  and  all  modes  of  motion ; 
(wings  only  proving  too  dangerous !) 
The  entire  art  of  minute  ornament ; 
And  the  deceptive  life  of  statues. 

By  his  personal  toil,  he  involves  the  fatal  labyrinth  for 
Minos  :  builds  an  impregnable  fortress  for  the  Agrigentines  ; 
adorns  healing  baths  among  the  wild  parsley  fields  of  Selinus ; 
buttresses  the  precipices  of  Eryx,  under  the  temple  of  Aph- 
rodite ;  and  for  her  temple  itself — finishes  in  exquisiteness 
the  golden  honeycomb. 

207.  Take  note  of  that  last  piece  of  his  art :  it  is  connected 
with  many  things  which  I  must  bring  before  you  when  we 
enter  on  the  study  of  architecture.  That  study  we  shall  begin 
at  the  foot  of  the  Baptistery  of  Florence,  which,  of  all  build- 
ings known  to  me,  unites  the  most  perfect  symmetry  with  the 
quaintest  77-01/aAta,  Then,  from  the  tomb  of  your  own  Edward 
the  Confessor,  to  the  farthest  shrine  of  the  opposite  Arabian 
and  Indian  world,  I  must  show  you  how  the  glittering  and 
iridescent  dominion  of  Daedalus  prevails  ;  and  his  ingenuity 
in  division,  interposition,  and  labyrinthine  sequence,  more 
widely  still.  Only  this  last  summer  I  found  the  dark  red 
masses  of  the  rough  sandstone  of  Furness  Abbey  had  been 
fitted  by  him,  with  no  less  pleasure  than  he  had  in  carving 
them,  into  wedged  hexagons — reminiscences  of  the  honey- 
comb of  Venus  Erycina.  His  ingenuity  plays  around  the 
framework  of  all  the  noblest  things;  and  yet  the  brightness 
of  it  has  a  lurid  shadow.  The  spot  of  the  fawn,  of  the  bird, 
and  the  moth,  may  be  harmless.  But  Daedalus  reigns  no  less 
over  the  spot  of  the  leopard  and  snake.  That  cruel  and  venom- 
ous power  of  his  art  is  marked,  in  the  legends  of  him,  by 


THE  SCHOOL  OF  ATHENS. 


411 


his  invention  of  the  saw  from  tlie  serpent's  tooth  ;  and  his 
seeking  refuge,  under  blood-guiltiness,  with  Minos,  who  can 
judge  evil,  and  measure,  or  remit,  the  penalty  of  it,  but  not 
reward  good :  Ehadamanthus  only  can  measure  that ;  but 
Minos  is  essentially  the  recognizer  of  evil  deeds  "  conoscitor 
delle  peccata,"  whom,  therefore,  you  find  in  Dante  under  the 
form  of  the  cpireTov.  "  Cignesi  con  la  coda  tante  volte,  quan- 
tunque  gradi  vuol  che  giu  sia  messa." 

And  this  peril  of  the  influence  of  Dsedalus  is  twofold  ;  first 
in  leading  us  to  delight  in  glitterings  and  semblances  of 
things,  more  than  in  their  form,  or  truth  ; — admire  the  harle- 
quin's jacket  more  than  the  hero's  strength  ;  and  love  the 
gilding  of  the  missal  more  than  its  words ; — but  farther,  and 
worse,  the  ingenuity  of  Daedalus  may  even  become  bestial,  an 
instinct  for  mechanical  labour  only,  strangely  involved  with  a 
feverish  and  ghastly  cruelty : — (you  will  find  this  distinct  in 
the  intensely  D8edal  work  of  the  Japanese)  ;  rebellious,  finally, 
against  the  laws  of  nature  and  honour,  and  building  labyrinths 
for  monsters, — not  combs  for  bees. 

208.  Gentlemen,  we  of  the  rough  northern  race  may  never, 
perhaps,  be  able  to  learn  from  the  Greek  his  reverence  for 
beauty  :  but  we  may  at  least  learn  his  disdain  of  mechanism  : 
— of  all  work  which  he  felt  to  be  monstrous  and  inhuman  in 
its  imprudent  dexterities. 

We  hold  ourselves,  we  English,  to  be  good  workmen.  I  do 
not  think  I  speak  with  light  reference  to  recent  calamity,  (for 
I  myself  lost  a  young  relation,  full  of  hope  and  good  purpose, 
in  the  foundered  ship  London,)  when  I  say  that  either  an 
iEginetan  or  Ionian  shipwright  built  ships  that  could  be  fought 
f  rom,  though  they  were  under  water ;  and  neither  of  them 
would  have  been  proud  of  having  built  one  that  would  fill  and 
sink  helplessly  if  the  sea  washed  over  her  deck,  or  turn  upside 
down  if  a  squall  struck  her  topsail. 

Believe  me,  gentlemen,  good  workmanship  consists  in  con- 
tinence and  common  sense,  more  than  in  frantic  expatiation 
of  mechanical  ingenuity ;  and  if  you  would  be  continent  and 
rational,  you  had  better  learn  more  of  Art  than  you  do  now, 
und  less  of  Engineering.    What  is  taking  place  at  this  very 


412 


ARATRA  RENTE L I  CI. 


hour,*  among  the  streets,  once  so  bright,  and  avenues  once  so 
pleasant,  of  the  fairest  city  in  Europe,  may  surely  lead  us  all 
to  feel  that  the  skill  of  Daedalus,  set  to  build  impregnable 
fortresses,  is  not  so  wisely  applied  as  in  framing  the  rp-qrov 
7tqvov, — the  golden  honeycomb. 

*  The  siege  of  Paris,  at  the  time  of  the  delivery  of  this  Lecture,  was 
in  one  of  its  most  destructive  phases. 


THE  FUTURE  OF  ENGLAND 

DELIVERED  AT  THE  R.  A.  INSTITUTION, 
WOOLWICH,  DECEMBER  14,  1869. 


THE  FUTURE  OF  ENGLAND. 


{Delivered  at  the  B.  A.  Institution,  Woolwich,  Deceiriber  14, 1869.) 

I  would  fain  have  left  to  the  frank  expression  of  the  moment, 
but  fear  I  could  not  have  found  clear  words — I  cannot  easily 
find  them,  even  deliberately, — to  tell  you  how  glad  I  am,  and 
yet  how  ashamed,  to  accept  your  permission  to  speak  to  you. 
Ashamed  of  appearing  to  think  that  I  can  tell  you  any  truth 
which  you  have  not  more  deeply  felt  than  I ;  but  glad  in  the 
thought  that  my  less  experience,  and  way  of  life  sheltered 
from  the  trials,  and  free  from  the  responsibilities  of  yours, 
may  have  left  me  with  something  of  a  child's  power  of  help  to 
you;  a  sureness  of  hope,  which  may  perhaps  be  the  one  thing 
that  can  be  helpful  to  men  who  have  done  too  much  not  to 
have  often  failed  in  doing  all  that  they  desired.  And  indeed, 
even  the  most  hopeful  of  us,  cannot  but  now  be  in  many 
things  apprehensive.  For  this  at  least  we  all  know  too  well, 
that  we  are  on  the  eve  of  a  great  political  crisis,  if  not  of 
political  change.  That  a  struggle  is  approaching  between  the 
newly-risen  power  of  democracy  and  the  apparently  departing 
power  of  feudalism  ;  and  another  struggle,  no  less  imminent, 
and  far  more  dangerous,  between  wealth  and  pauperism. 
These  two  quarrels  are  constantly  thought  of  as  the  same. 
They  are  being  fought  together,  and  an  apparently  common 
interest  unites  for  the  most  part  the  millionaire  with  the 
noble,  in  resistance  to  a  multitude,  crying,  part  of  it  for 
bread  and  part  of  it  for  liberty. 

And  yet  no  two  quarrels  can  be  more  distincu.  Riches — 
so  far  from  being  necessary  to  noblesse — are  adverse  to  it. 
So  utterly  adverse,  that  the  first  character  of  all  the  Nobilities 
which  have  founded  great  dynasties  in  the  world  is  to  be 


416 


THE  CROWN  OF  WILD  OLIVE. 


poor  ; — often  poor  by  oath — always  poor  by  generosity.  And 
of  every  true  knight  in  the  chivalric  ages,  the  first  thing  his- 
tory tells  you  is,  that  he  never  kept  treasure  for  himself. 

Thus  the  causes  of  wealth  and  noblesse  are  not  the  same  ; 
but  opposite.  On  the  other  hand,  the  causes  of  anarchy  and 
of  the  poor  are  not  the  same,  but  opposite.  Side  by  side,  in 
the  same  rank,  are  now  indeed  set  the  pride  that  revolts 
against  authority,  and  the  misery  that  appeals  against  avarice. 
But,  so  far  from  being  a  common  cause,  all  anarchy  is  the 
forerunner  of  poverty,  and  all  prosperity  begins  in  obedience. 
So  that  thus,  it  has  become  impossible  to  give  due  support 
to  the  cause  of  order,  without  seeming  to  countenance  injury  ; 
and  impossible  to  plead  justly  the  claims  of  sorrow,  without 
seeming  to  plead  also  for  those  of  license. 

Let  me  try,  then,  to  put  in  very  brief  terms,  the  real  plan 
of  this  various  quarrel,  and  the  truth  of  the  cause  on  each 
side.  Let  us  face  that  full  truth,  whatever  it  may  be,  and 
decide  what  part,  according  to  our  power,  we  should  take  in 
the  quarrel. 

First.  For  eleven  hundred  years,  all  but  five,  since  Char- 
lemagne set  on  his  head  the  Lombard  crown,  the  body  of 
European  people  have  submitted  patiently  to  be  governed  ; 
generally  by  kings — always  by  single  leaders  of  some  kind. 
But  for  the  last  fifty  years  they  have  begun  to  suspect,  and  of 
late  they  have  many  of  them  concluded,  that  they  have  been 
on  the  whole  ill-governed,  or  misgoverned,  by  their  kings. 
Whereupon  they  say,  more  and  more  widely,  "Let  us  hence- 
forth have  no  kings  ;  and  no  government  at  all." 

Now  we  said,  we  must  face  the  full  truth  of  the  matter,  in 
order  to  see  what  we  are  to  do.  And  the  truth  is  that  the 
people  have  been  misgoverned  ; — that  very  little  is  to  be  said, 
hitherto,  for  most  of  their  masters — and  that  certainly  in 
many  places  they  will  try  their  new  system  of  "  no  masters 
■ — and  as  that  arrangement  will  be  delightful  to  all  foolish 
persons,  and,  at  first,  profitable  to  all  wicked  ones, — and  as 
these  classes  are  not  wanting  or  unimportant  in  any  human 
society,— the  experiment  is  likely  to  be  tried  extensively. 
And  the  world  may  be  quite  content  to  endure  much  suffer- 


THE  FUTURE  OF  ENGLAND. 


417 


ing  with  this  fresh  hope,  and  retain  its  faith  in  anarchy, 
whatever  comes  of  it,  till  it  can  endure  no  more. 

Then,  secondly.  The  people  have  begun  to  suspect  that 
one  particular  form  of  this  past  misgovernment  has  been,  that 
their  masters  have  set  them  to  do  all  the  work,  and  have 
themselves  taken  all  the  wages.  In  a  word,  that  what  was 
called  governing  them,  meant  only  wearing  fine  clothes,  and 
living  on  good  fare  at  their  expense.  And  I  am  sorry  to  say, 
the  people  are  quite  right  in  this  opinion  also.  If  you  in- 
quire into  the  vital  fact  of  the  matter,  this  you  will  find  to  be 
the  constant  structure  of  European  society  for  the  thousand 
years  of  the  feudal  system  ;  it  was  divided  into  peasants  who 
lived  by  working  ;  priests  who  lived  by  begging  ;  and  knights 
who  lived  by  pillaging ;  and  as  the  luminous  public  mind 
becomes  gradually  cognizant  of  these  facts,  it  will  assuredly 
not  suffer  things  to  be  altogether  arranged  that  way  any  more  ; 
and  the  devising  of  other  ways  will  be  an  agitating  business  ; 
especially  because  the  first  impression  of  the  intelligent  popu- 
lace is,  that  whereas,  in  the  dark  ages,  half  the  nation  lived 
idle,  in  the  bright  ages  to  come,  the  whole  of  it  may. 

Now,  thirdly — and  here  is  much  the  worst  phase  of  the 
crisis.  This  past  system  of  misgovernment,  especially  during 
the  last  three  hundred  years,  has  prepared,  by  its  neglect,  a 
class  among  the  lower  orders  which  it  is  now  peculiarly  diffi- 
cult to  govern.  It  deservedly  lost  their  respect — but  that  was 
the  least  part  of  the  mischief.  The  deadly  part  of  it  was, 
that  the  lower  orders  lost  their  habit,  and  at  last  their  faculty, 
of  respect ; — lost  the  very  capability  of  reverence,  which  is 
the  most  precious  part  of  the  human  soul.  Exactly  in  the 
degree  ill  which  you  can  find  creatures  greater  than  yourself, 
to  look  up  to,  in  that  degree,  you  are  ennobled  yourself,  and, 
in  that  degree,  happy.  If  you  could  live  always  in  the  pres- 
ence of  archangels,  you  would  be  happier  than  in  that  of 
men ;  but  even  if  only  in  the  company  of  admirable  knights 
and  beautiful  ladies,  the  more  noble  and  bright  they  were, 
and  the  more  you  could  reverence  their  virtue  the  happier 
you  would  be.  On  the  contrary,  if  you  were  condemned 
to  live  among  a  multitude  of  idiots,  dumb,  distorted  and 


418 


THE  GROWN  OF  WILD  OLIVE. 


malicious,  you  would  not  be  happy  in  the  constant  sense  of 
your  own  superiority.  Thus  all  real  joy  and  power  of  prog- 
ress in  humanity  depend  on  finding  something  to  rever- 
ence ;  and  all  the  baseness  and  misery  of  humanity  begin  in  a 
habit  of  disdain.  Now,  by  general  misgovernment,  I  repeat, 
we  have  created  in  Europe  a  vast  populace,  and  out  of  Eu- 
rope a  still  vaster  one,  which  has  lost  even  the  power  and 
conception  of  reverence  ;  * — which  exists  only  in  the  wor- 
ship of  itself — which  can  neither  see  anything  beautiful 
around  it,  nor  conceive  anything  virtuous  above  it  ;  which 
has,  towards  all  goodness  and  greatness,  no  other  feelings 
than  those  of  the  lowest  creatures — fear,  hatred,  or  hunger  ; 
a  populace  which  has  sunk  below  your  appeal  in  their  nature, 
as  it  has  risen  beyond  your  power  in  their  multitude  ; — 
whom  you  can  now  no  more  charm  than  you  can  the  adder, 
nor  discipline,  than  you  can  the  summer  fly. 

It  is  a  crisis,  gentlemen  ;  and  time  to  think  of  it.  I  have 
roughly  and  broadly  put  it  before  you  in  its  darkness.  Let 
us  look  what  we  may  find  of  light. 

Only  the  other  day,  in  a  journal  which  is  a  fairly  repre- 
sentative exponent  of  the  Conservatism  of  our  day,  and  for 
the  most  part  not  at  all  in  favor  of  strikes  or  other  popular 
proceedings  ;  only  about  three  weeks  since,  there  was  a  lead- 
er, with  this,  or  a  similar,  title — "  What  is  to  become  of  the 
House  of  Lords?"  It  startled  me,  for  it  seemed  as  if  we 
were  going  even  faster  than  I  had  thought,  when  such  a  ques- 
tion was  put  as  a  subject  of  quite  open  debate,  in  a  journal 
meant  chiefly  for  the  reading  of  the  middle  and  upper  classes. 
Open  or  not — the  debate  is  near.  What  is  to  become  of 
them  ?  And  the  answer  to  such  question  depends  first  on 
their  being  able  to  answer  another  question — "  What  is  the  use 
of  them  !  "  For  some  time  back,  I  think  the  theory  of  the  na- 
tion has  been,  that  they  are  useful  as  impediments  to  busi- 
ness, so  as  to  give  time  for  second  thoughts.  But  the  nation 
is  getting  impatient  of  impediments  to  business  ;  and  cer- 
tainly, sooner  or  later,  will  think  it  needless  to  maintain  these 

*  Compare  Time  and  Tide,  §  169,  and  Fors  Clavigera,  Letter  XIV. 
fcage  9# 


THE  FUTURE  OF  ENGLAND. 


419 


expensive  obstacles  to  its  humors.  And  I  have  not  heard, 
either  in  public,  or  from  any  of  themselves,  a  clear  expres- 
sion of  their  own  conception  of  their  use.  So  that  it  seems 
thus  to  become  needful  for  all  men  to  tell  them,  as  our  one 
quite  clear-sighted  teacher,  Carlyle,  has  been  telling  us  for 
many  a  year,  that  the  use  of  the  Lords  of  a  country  is  to 
govern  the  country.  If  they  answer  that  use,  the  country 
will  rejoice  in  keeping  them  ;  if  not,  that  will  become  of 
them  which  must  of  all  things  found  to  have  lost  their  ser- 
viceableness. 

Here,  therefore,  is  the  one  question,  at  this  crisis,  for 
them,  and  for  us.  Will  they  be  lords  indeed,  and  give 
us  laws — dukes  indeed,  and  give  us  guiding — princes  indeed, 
and  give  us  beginning,  of  truer  dynasty,  which  shall  not  be 
soiled  by  covetousness,  nor  disordered  by  iniquity?  Have 
they  themselves  sunk  so  far  as  not  to  hope  this  ?  Are  there 
yet  any  among  them  who  can  stand  forward  with  open  English 
brows,  and  say, — So  far  as  in  me  lies,  I  will  govern  with  my 
might,  not  for  Dieu  et  mon  Droit,  but  for  the  first  grand 
reading  of  the  war  cry,  from  which  that  was  corrupted,  "  Dieu 
et  Droit  ?  "  Among  them  I  know  there  are  some — among 
you,  soldiers  of  England,  I  know  there  are  many,  who  can  do 
this  ;  and  in  you  is  our  trust.  I,  one  of  the  lower  people 
of  your  country,  ask  of  you  in  their  name — you  whom  I  will 
not  any  more  call  soldiers,  but  by  the  truer  name  of 
Knights  ; — Equites  of  England.  How  many  yet  of  you  are 
there,  knights  errant  now  beyond  all  former  fields  of  danger 
— knights  patient  now  beyond  all  former  endurance  ;  who 
still  retain  the  ancient  and  eternal  purpose  of  knighthood,  to 
subdue  the  wicked,  and  aid  the  weak  ?  To  them,  be  they 
few  or  many,  we  English  people  call  for  help  to  the  wretched- 
ness, and  for  rule  over  the  baseness,  of  multitudes  desolate 
and  deceived,  shrieking  to  one  another  this  new  gospel  of 
their  new  religion.  "  Let  the  weak  do  as  they  can,  and  the 
wicked  as  they  will/' 

I  can  hear  you  saying  in  your  hearts,  even  the  bravest 
of  you,  "  The  time  is  past  for  all  that."  Gentlemen,  it  is  not 
so.   The  time  has  come  for  more  than  all  that.  Hitherto, 


420 


THE  GROWN  OF  WILD  OLIVE. 


soldiers  have  given  their  lives  for  false  fame,  and  for  cruel 
power.  The  day  is  now  when  they  must  give  their  lives  for 
true  fame,  and  for  beneficent  power  :  and  the  work  is  near 
every  one  of  you — close  beside  you — the  means  of  it  even 
thrust  into  your  hands.  The  people  are  crying  to  you  for 
command,  and  you  stand  there  at  pause,  and  silent.  You 
think  they  don't  want  to  be  commanded  ;  try  them  ;  deter- 
mine what  is  needful  for  them — honorable  for  them  ;  show  it 
them,  promise  to  bring  them  to  it,  and  they  will  follow  you 
through  fire,  "  Govern  us,"  they  cry  with  one  heart,  though 
in  any  minds.  They  can  be  governed  still,  these  English  ; 
they  are  men  still ;  not  gnats,  nor  serpents.  They  love  their 
old  ways  yet,  and  their  old  masters,  and  their  old  land. 
They  would  fain  live  in  it,  as  many  as  may  stay  there,  if  you 
will  show  them  how",  there,  to  live  ; — or  show  them  even,  how, 
there,  like  Englishmen,  to  die. 

u  To  live  in  it,  as  many  as  may ! "  How  many  do  you 
think  may  ?  How  many  can  ?  How  many  do  you  want  to 
live  there  ?  As  masters,  your  first  object  must  be  to  increase 
your  power  ;  and  in  what  does  the  power  of  a  country  con- 
sist ?  Will  you  have  dominion  over  its  stones,  or  over  its 
clouds,  or  over  its  souls?  What  do  you  mean  by  a  great 
nation,  but  a  great  multitude  of  men  who  are  true  to  each 
other,  and  strong,  and  of  worth  ?  Now  you  can  increase  the 
multitude  only  definitely — your  island  has  only  so  much 
standing  room —but  you  can  increase  the  worth  indefinitely. 
It  is  but  a  little  island  ;— -suppose,  little  as  it  is,  you  were  to 
fill  it  with  friends  ?  You  may,  and  that  easily.  You  must, 
and  that  speedily  ;  or  there  will  be  an  end  to  this  England  of 
ours,  and  to  all  its  loves  and  enmities. 

To  fill  this  little  island  with  true  friends — men  brave, 
wise,  and  happy !  Is  it  so  impossible,  think  you,  after  the 
world's  eighteen  hundred  years  of  Christianity,  and  our  own 
thousand  years  of  toil,  to  fill  only  this  little  white  gleaming- 
crag  with  happy  creatures,  helpful  to  each  other?  Africa, 
and  India,  and  the  Brazilian  wide-watered  plain,  are  these 
not  wide  enough  for  the  ignorance  of  our  race  ?  have  they 
not  space  enough  for  its  pain  ?    Must  we  remain  here  also 


THE  FUTURE  OF  ENGLAND. 


421 


savage, — here  at  enmity  with  each  other, — here  foodless, 
houseless,  in  rags,  in  dust,  and  without  hope,  as  thousands 
and  tens  of  thousands  of  us  are  lying  ?  Do  not  think  it, 
gentlemen.  The  thought  that  it  is  inevitable  is  the  last  infi- 
delity ;  infidelity  not  to  God  only,  but  to  every  creature  and 
every  law  that  He  has  made.  Are  we  to  think  that  the 
earth  was  only  shaped  to  be  a  globe  of  torture  ;  and  that 
there  cannot  be  one  spot  of  it  where  peace  can  rest,  or  justice 
reign  ?  Where  are  men  ever  to  be  happy,  if  not  in  England  ? 
by  whom  shall  they  ever  be  taught  to  do  right,  if  not  by  you  ? 
Are  we  not  of  a  race  first  among  the  strong  ones  of  the  earth  ; 
the  blood  in  us  incapable  of  weariness,  unconquerable  by 
grief  ?  Have  we  not  a  history  of  which  we  can  hardly  think 
without  becoming  insolent  in  our  just  pride  of  it?  Can  we 
dare,  without  passing  every  limit  of  courtesy  to  other  nations, 
to  say  how  much  more  we  have  to  be  proud  of  in  our  ances- 
tors than  they  ?  Among  our  ancient  monarchs,  great  crimes 
stand  out  as  monstrous  and  strange.  But  their  valor,  and, 
according  to  their  understanding,  their  benevolence,  are  con- 
stant. The  Wars  of  the  Roses,  which  are  as  a  fearful  crimson 
shadow  on  our  land,  represent  the  normal  condition  of  other 
nations  ;  while  from  the  days  of  the  Heptarchy  downwards 
we  have  had  examples  given  us,  in  all  ranks,  of  the  most 
varied  and  exalted  virtue  ;  a  heap  of  treasure  that  no  moth 
can  corrupt,  and  which  even  our  traitorship,  if  we  are  to  be- 
come traitors  to  it,  cannot  sully. 

And  this  is  the  race,  then,  that  we  know  not  any  more  how 
to  govern  !  and  this  the  history  which  we  are  to  behold 
broken  off  by  sedition  !  and  this  is  the  country,  of  all  others, 
where  life  is  to  become  difficult  to  the  honest,  and  ridiculous 
to  the  wise !  .  And  the  catastrophe,  forsooth,  is  to  come  just 
when  we  have  been  making  swiftest  progress  beyond  the  wis- 
dom and  wealth  of  the  past.  Our  cities  are  a  wilderness  of 
spinning  wheels  instead  of  palaces  ;  yet  the  people  have  not 
clothes.  We  have  blackened  every  leaf  of  English  greenwood 
with  ashes,  and  the  people  die  of  cold  ;  our  harbors  are  a 
forest  of  merchant  ships,  and  the  people  die  of  hunger. 

Whose  fault  is  it  ?    Yours,  gentlemen ;  yours  only.  You 


422 


THE  CROWN  OF  WILD  OLIVE. 


alone  can  feed  them,  and  clothe,  and  bring  into  their  right 
minds,  for  you  only  can  govern — that  is  to  say,  you  only  can 
educate  them. 

Educate,  or  govern,  they  are  one  and  the  same  word. 
Education  does  not  mean  teaching  people  to  know  what  they 
do  not  know.  It  means  teaching  them  to  behave  as  they  do 
not  behave.  And  the  true  "  compulsory  education  "  which 
the  people  now  ask  of  you  is  not  catechism,  but  drill.  It  is 
not  teaching  the  youth  of  England  the  shapes  of  letters  and 
the  tricks  of  numbers ;  and  then  leaving  them  to  turn  their 
arithmetic  to  roguery,  and  their  literature  to  lust.  It  is,  on 
the  contrary,  training  them  into  the  perfect  exercise  and 
kingly  continence  of  their  bodies  and  souls.  It  is  a  painful, 
continual,  and  difficult  work  ;  to  be  done  by  kindness,  by 
watching,  by  warning,  by  precept,  and  by  praise, — but  above 
all — by  example. 

Compulsory !  Yes,  by  all  means !  "  Go  ye  out  into 
the  highways  and  hedges,  and  compel  them  to  come  in." 
Compulsory  !  Yes,  and  gratis  also.  Dei  Gratia,  they  must  be 
taught,  as,  Dei  Gratia,  you  are  set  to  teach  them.  I  hear 
strange  talk  continually,  "  how  difficult  it  is  to  make  people 
pay  for  being  educated  !  "  Why,  I  should  think  so  !  Do  you 
make  your  children  pay  for  their  education,  or  do  you  give  it 
them  compulsorily,  and  gratis  ?  You  do  not  expect  them  to 
pay  you  for  their  teaching,  except  by  becoming  good  chil- 
dren. Why  should  you  expect  a  peasant  to  pay  for  his,  ex- 
cept by  becoming  a  good  man  ? — payment  enough,  I  think, 
if  we  knew  it.  Payment  enough  to  himself,  as  to  us.  For 
that  is  another  of  our  grand  popular  mistakes — people  are 
always  thinking  of  education  as  a  means  of  livelihood.  Edu- 
cation is  not  a  profitable  business,  but  a  costly  one ;  nay, 
even  the  best  attainments  of  it  are  always  unprofitable,  in  any 
terms  of  coin.  No  nation  ever  made  its  bread  either  by  its 
great  arts,  or  its  great  wisdoms.  By  its  minor  arts  or  manu- 
factures, by  its  practical  knowledges,  yes :  but  its  noble 
scholarship,  its  noble  philosophy,  and  its  noble  art,  are  always 
to  be  bought  as  a  treasure,  not  sold  for  a  livelihood.  You  do 
not  learn  that  you  may  live — you  live  that  you  may  learn. 


THE  FUTURE  OF  ENGLAND. 


423 


You  are  to  spend  on  National  Education,  and  to  be  spent  for 
it,  and  to  make  by  it,  not  more  money,  but  better  men ; — to 
get  into  this  British  Island  the  greatest  possible  number  of 
good  and  brave  Englishmen.  They  are  to  be  your  "  money's 
worth." 

But  where  is  the  money  to  come  from  ?  Yes,  that  is  to  be 
asked.  Let  us,  as  quite  the  first  business  in  this  our  national 
crisis,  look  not  only  into  our  affairs,  but  into  our  accounts, 
and  obtain  some  general  notion  how  we  annually  spend  our 
money,  and  what  we  are  getting  for  it.  Observe,  I  do  not 
mean  to  inquire  into  the  public  revenue  only ;  of  that  some 
account  is  rendered  already.  But  let  us  do  the  best  we  can 
to  set  down  the  items  of  the  national  'private  expenditure  ; 
and  know  what  we  spend  altogether,  and  how. 

To  begin  with  this  matter  of  education.  You  probably 
have  nearly  all  seen  the  admirable  lecture  lately  given  by 
Captain  Maxse,  at  Southampton.  It  contains  a  clear  state- 
ment of  the  facts  at  present  ascertained  as  to  our  expenditure 
in  that  respect.  It  appears  that  of  our  public  moneys,  for 
every  pound  that  we  spend  on  education  we  spend  twelve 
either  in  charity  or  punishment ; — ten  millions  a  year  in  pau- 
perism and  crime,  and  eight  hundred  thousand  in  instruction. 
Now  Captain  Maxse  adds  to  this  estimate  of  ten  millions  pub- 
lic money  spent  on  crime  and  want,  a  more  or  less  conjectural 
sum  of  eight  millions  for  private  charities.  My  impression  is 
that  this  is  much  beneath  the  truth,  but  at  all  events  it  leaves 
out  of  consideration  much  the  heaviest  and  saddest  form  of 
charity — the  maintenance,  by  the  working  members  of  fami- 
lies, of  the  unfortunate  or  ill-conducted  persons  whom  the 
general  course  of  misrule  now  leaves  helpless  to  be  the  bur- 
den of  the  rest. 

Now  I  want  to  get  first  at  some,  I  do  not  say  approx- 
imate, but  at  all  events  some  suggestive,  estimate  of  the  quan- 
tity of  real  distress  and  misguided  life  in  this  country.  Then 
next,  I  want  some  fairly  representative  estimate  of  our  private 
expenditure  in  luxuries.  We  won't  spend  more,  publicly,  it 
appears,  than  eight  hundred  thousand  a  year,  on  educating 
men  gratis.    I  want  to  know,  as  nearly  as  possible,  what  we 


424 


THE  CROWN  OF  WILD  OLIVE. 


spend  privately  a  year,  in  educating  horses  gratis.  Let  us,  at 
least,  quit  ourselves  in  this  from  the  taunt  of  Rabshakeh,  and 
see  that  for  every  horse  we  train  also  a  horseman  ;  and  that 
the  rider  be  at  least  as  high-bred  as  the  horse,  not  jockey, 
but  chevalier.  Again,  we  spend  eight  hundred  thousand, 
which  is  certainty  a  great  deal  of  money,  in  making  rough 
minds  bright.  I  want  to  know  how  much  we  spend  annually 
in  making  rough  stones  bright ;  that  is  to  say,  what  may  be 
the  united  annual  sum,  or  near  it,  of  our  jewellers'  bills.  So 
much  we  pay  for  educating  children  gratis  ; — how  much  for 
educating  diamonds  gratis?  and  which  pays  best  for  bright- 
ening, the  spirit  or  the  charcoal  ?  Let  us  get  those  two  items 
set  down  with  some  sincerity,  and  a  few  more  of  the  same 
kind.  Publicly  set  down.  "We  must  not  be  ashamed  of  the 
way  we  spend  our  money.  If  our  right  hand  is  not  to  know 
what  our  left  does,  it  must  not  be  because  it  would  be 
ashamed  if  it  did. 

That  is,  therefore,  quite  the  first  practical  thing  to  be  done. 
Let  every  man  who  wishes  well  to  his  country,  render  it  yearly 
an  account  of  his  income,  and  of  the  main  heads  of  his  ex- 
penditure ;  or,  if  he  is  ashamed  to  do  so,  let  him  no  more 
impute  to  the  poor  their  poverty  as  a  crime,  nor  set  them  to 
break  stones  in  order  to  frighten  them  from  committing  it. 
To  lose  money  ill  is  indeed  often  a  crime ;  but  to  get  it  ill  is 
a  worse  one,  and  to  spend  it  ill,  worst  of  all.  You  object, 
Lords  of  England,  to  increase,  to  the  poor,  the  wages  you  give 
them,  because  they  spend  them,  you  say,  unadvisedly.  Ren- 
der them,  therefore,  an  account  of  the  wages  which  they  give 
you ;  and  show  them,  by  your  example,  how  to  spend  theirs,  to 
the  last  farthing  advisedly. 

It  is  indeed  time  to  make  this  an  acknowledged  sub- 
ject of  instruction,  to  the  workingman, — how  to  spend  his 
wages.  For,  gentlemen,  we  must  give  that  instruction, 
whether  we  will  or  no,  one  way  or  the  other.  We  have  given 
it  in  years  gone  by  ;  and  now  we  find  fault  with  our  peasantry 
for  having  been  too  docile,  and  profited  too  shrewdly  by  our 
tuition.  Only  a  few  clays  since  I  had  a  letter  from  the  wife  of 
a  village  rector,  a  man  of  common  sense  and  kindness,  who 


THE  FUTURE  OF  ENGLAND. 


425 


was  greatly  troubled  in  his  mind  because  it  was  precisely  the 
men  who  got  highest  wages  in  summer  that  came  desti- 
tute to  his  door  in  the  winter.  Destitute,  and  of  riotous 
temper — for  their  method  of  spending  wages  in  their  period  of 
prosperity  was  by  sitting  two  days  a  week  in  the  tavern  par- 
lor, ladling  port  wine,  not  out  of  bowls,  but  out  of  buckets. 
Well,  gentlemen,  who  taught  them  that  method  of  festivity? 
Thirty  years  ago,  I,  a  most  inexperienced  freshman,  went  to 
my  first  college  supper  ;  at  the  head  of  the  table  sat  a  noble- 
man of  high  promise  and  of  admirable  powers,  since  dead  of 
palsy ;  there  also  we  had  in  the  midst  of  us,  not  buckets, 
indeed,  but  bowls  as  large  as  buckets ;  there  also,  we  helped 
ourselves  with  ladles.  There  (for  this  beginning  of  college 
education  was  compulsory),  I  choosing  ladlefuls  of  punch  in- 
stead of  claret,  because  I  was  then  able,  unperceived  to 
pour  them  into  my  waistcoat  instead  of  down  my  throat, 
stood  it  out  to  the  end,  and  helped  to  carry  four  of  my  fellow- 
students,  one  of  them  the  son  of  the  head  of  a  college,  head 
foremost,  down  stairs  and  home. 

Such  things  are  no  more ;  but  the  fruit  of  them  re- 
mains, and  will  for  many  a  day  to  come.  The  laborers  whom 
you  cannot  now  shut  out  of  the  ale-house  are  only  the  too 
faithful  disciples  of  the  gentlemen  who  were  wont  to  shut 
themselves  into  the  dining-room.  The  gentlemen  have  not 
thought  it  necessary,  in  order  to  correct  their  own  habits,  to 
diminish  their  incomes  ;  and,  believe  me,  the  way  to  deal 
with  your  drunken  workman  is  not  to  lower  his  wages, — but 
to  mend  his  wits.* 

And  if  indeed  we  do  not  yet  see  quite  clearly  how  to 
deal  with  the  sins  of  our  poor  brother,  it  is  possible  that  our 
dimness  of  sight  may  still  have  other  causes  that  can  be  cast 
out.  There  are  two  opposite  cries  of  the  great  liberal  and 
conservative  parties,  which  are  both  most  right,  and  worthy 
to  be  rallying  cries.  On  their  side  "  let  every  man  have  his 
chance;"  on  yours  "let  every  man  stand  in  his  place." 
Yes,  indeed,  let  that  be  so,  every  man  in  his  place,  and 

*  See  Appendix,  " Modern  Education,"  and  compare  §  70  of  Time 
and  Tide, 


426 


THE  GROWN  OF  WILD  OLIVE. 


every  man  fit  for  it.  See  that  be  holds  that  place  from 
Heaven's  Providence  ;  and  not  from  his  family's  Providence. 
Let  the  Lords  Spiritual  quit  themselves  of  simony,  we  laymen 
will  look  after  the  heretics  for  them.  Let  the  Lords  Tem- 
poral quit  themselves  of  nepotism,  and  we  will  take  care  of 
their  authority  for  them.  Publish  for  us,  you  soldiers,  an 
army  gazette,  in  which  the  one  subject  of  daily  intelligence 
shall  be  the  grounds  of  promotion  ;  a  gazette  which  shall 
simply  tell  us,  what  there  certainly  can  be  no  detriment  to 
the  service  in  our  knowing,  when  any  officer  is  appointed  to 
a  new  command, — what  his  former  services  and  successes 
have  been, — whom  he  has  superseded, — and  on  what  ground. 
It  will  be  always  a  satisfaction  to  us  ;  it  may  sometimes  be  an 
advantage  to  you :  and  then,  when  there  is  really  necessary 
debate  respecting  reduction  of  wages,  let  us  always  begin  not 
with  the  wages  of  the  industrious  classes,  but  with  those  of 
the  idle  ones.  Let  there  there  be  honorary  titles,  if  people 
like  them  ;  but  let  there  be  no  honorary  incomes. 

So  much  for  the  master's  motto,  "  Every  man  in  his 
place."  Next  for  the  laborer's  motto,  "  Every  man  his 
chance."  Let  us  mend  that  for  them  a  little,  and  say, 
"  Every  man  his  certainty  " — certainty,  that  if  he  does  well, 
he  will  be  honored,  and  aided,  and  advanced  in  such  degree 
as  may  be  fitting  for  his  faculty  and  consistent  with  his 
peace  ;  and  equal  certainty  that  if  he  does  ill,  he  will  by  sure 
justice  be  judged,  and  by  sure  punishment  be  chastised  ;  if 
it  may  be,  corrected ;  and  if  that  may  not  be,  condemned. 
That  is  the  right  reading  of  the  Kepublican  motto,  "  Every 
man  his  chance."  And  then,  with  such  a  system  of  govern- 
ment, pure,  watchful  and  just,  you  may  approach  your  great 
problem  of  national  education,  or  in  other  words,  of  national 
employment.  For  all  education  begins  in  work.  What  we 
think,  or  what  we  know,  or  what  we  believe,  is  in  the  end,  of 
little  consequence.  The  only  thing  of  consequence  is  what 
we  do ;  and  for  man,  woman,  or  child,  the  first  point  of  edu- 
cation is  to  make  them  do  their  best.  It  is  the  law  of  good 
economy  to  make  the  best  of  everything.  How  much  more 
to  make  the  best  of  every  creature  !    Therefore,  when  your 


THE  FUTURE  OF  ENGLAND. 


427 


pauper  comes  to  you  and  asks  for  bread,  ask  of  him  instantly 
— What  faculty  have  you?  What  can  you  do  best?  Can 
you  drive  a  nail  into  wood?  Go  and  mend  the  parish  fences. 
Can  you  lay  a  brick  ?  Mend  the  walls  of  the  cottages  where 
the  wind  comes  in.  Can  you  lift  a  spadeful  of  earth  ?  Turn 
this  field  up  three  feet  deep  all  over.  Can  you  only  drag  a 
weight  with  your  shoulders  ?  Stand  at  the  bottom  of  this 
hill  and  help  up  the  overladen  horses.  Can  you  weld  iron 
and  chisel  stone?  Fortify  this  wreck-strewn  coast  into  a 
harbor ;  and  change  these  shifting  sands  into  fruitful  ground. 
Wherever  death  was,  bring  life  ;  that  is  to  be  your  work  ; 
that  your  parish  refuge  ;  that  your  education.  So  and  no 
otherwise  can  we  meet  existent  distress.  But  for  the  contin- 
ual education  of  the  whole  people,  and  for  their  future  hap- 
piness, they  must  have  such  consistent  employment  as  shall 
develop  all  the  powers  of  the  fingers,  and  the  limbs,  and  the 
brain  :  and  that  development  is  only  to  be  obtained  by  hand- 
labor,  of  which  you  have  these  four  great  divisions — hand- 
labor  on  the  earth,  hand-labor  on  the  sea,  hand-labor  in  art, 
hand-labor  in  war.  Of  the  last  two  of  these  I  cannot  speak 
to-night,  and  of  the  first  two  only  with  extreme  brevity. 

I  Hand-labor  on  the  earth,  the  work  of  the  husbandman 
and  of  the  shepherd;— to  dress  the  earth  and  to  keep  the 
flocks  of  it — the  first  task  of  man,  and  the  final  one — the 
education  always  of  noblest  lawgivers,  kings  and  teachers  ; 
the  education  of  Hesiod,  of  Moses,  of  David,  of  all  the  true 
strength  of  Rome  ;  and  all  its  tenderness :  the  pride  of  Cin- 
cinnatus,  and  the  inspiration  of  Virgil.  Hand-labor  on  the 
earth,  and  the  harvest  of  it  brought  forth  with  singing  : — not 
steam-piston  labor  on  the  earth,  and  the  harvest  of  it  brought 
forth  with  steam-whistling.  You  will  have  no  prophet's  voice 
accompanied  by  that  shepherd's  pipe,  and  pastoral  symphony. 
Do  you  know  that  lately,  in  Cumberland,  in  the  chief  pastoral 
district  of  England — in  Wordsworth's  own  home — a  proces- 
sion of  villagers  on  their  festa  day  provided  for  themselves, 
by  way  of  music,  a  steam-plough  whistling  at  the  head  of 
them. 

Give  me  patience  while  I  put  the  principle  of  machine 


428 


THE  CROWN  OF  WILD  OLIVE. 


labor  before  you,  as  clearly  and  in  as  short  compass  as  pos- 
sible ;  it  is  one  that  should  be  known  at  this  juncture.  Sup- 
pose a  farming  proprietor  needs  to  employ  a  hundred  men  on 
his  estate,  and  that  the  labor  of  these  hundred  men  is  enough, 
but  not  more  than  enough,  to  till  all  his  land,  and  to  raise 
from  it  food  for  his  own  family,  and  for  the  hundred  laborers. 
He  is  obliged,  under  such  circumstances,  to  maintain  all  the 
men  in  moderate  comfort,  and  can  only  by  economy  accumu- 
late much  for  himself.  But,  suppose  he  contrive  a  machine 
that  will  easily  do  the  work  of  fifty  men,  with  only  one  man 
to  watch  it.  This  sounds  like  a  great  advance  in  civilization. 
The  farmer  of  course  gets  his  machine  made,  turns  off  the 
fifty  men,  who  may  starve  or  emigrate  at  their  choice,  and 
now  he  can  keep  half  of  the  produce  of  his  estate,  which  for- 
merly went  to  feed  them,  all  to  himself.  That  is  the  essential 
and  constant  operation  of  machinery  among  us  at  this  moment. 

Nay,  it  is  at  first  answered  ;  no  man  can  in  reality  keep  half 
the  produce  of  an  estate  to  himself,  nor  can  he  in  the  end 
keep  more  than  his  own  human  share  of  anything ;  his  riches 
must  diffuse  themselves  at  some  time  ;  he  must  maintain  some- 
body else  with  them,  however  he  spends  them.  That  is  mainly 
true  (not  altogether  so),  for  food  and  fuel  are  in  ordinary  cir- 
cumstances personally  wasted  by  rich  people,  in  quantities 
which  would  save  many  lives.  One  of  my  own  great  luxuries, 
for  instance,  is  candlelight — and  I  probably  burn,  for  myself 
alone,  as  many  candles  during  the  winter,  as  would  comfort 
the  old  eyes,  or  spare  the  young  ones,  of  a  whole  rushlighted 
country  village.  Still,  it  is  mainly  true,  that  it  is  not  by  their 
personal  waste  that  rich  people  prevent  the  lives  of  the  poor. 
This  is  the  way  they  do  it.  Let  me  go  back  to  my  farmer. 
He  has  got  his  machine  made,  which  goes  creaking,  scream- 
ing, and  occasionally  exploding,  about  modern  Arcadia.  He 
has  turned  off  his  fifty  men  to  starve.  Now,  at  some  distance 
from  his  own  farm,  there  is  another  on  which  the  laborers 
were  working  for  their  bread  in  the  same  way,  by  tilling  the 
land.  The  machinist  sends  over  to  these,  saying — "I  have 
got  food  enough  for  you  without  your  digging  or  ploughing 
any  more.    I  can  maintain  you  in  other  occupations  instead 


THE  FUTURE  OF  ENGLAND. 


429 


of  ploughing  that  land  ;  if  you  rake  in  its  gravel  you  will  find 
some  hard  stones — you  shall  grind  those  on  mills  till  they 
glitter ;  then,  my  wife  shall  wear  a  necklace  of  them.  Also, 
if  you  turn  up  the  meadows  below  you  will  find  some  fine 
white  clay,  of  which  you  shall  make  a  porcelain  service  for  me  : 
and  the  rest  of  the  farm  I  want  for  pasture  for  horses  for  my 
carriage — and  you  shall  groom  them,  and  some  of  you  ride 
behind  the  carriage  with  staves  in  your  hands,  and  I  will  keep 
you  much  fatter  for  doing  that  than  you  can  keep  yourselves 
by  digging." 

Well — but  it  is  answered,  are  we  to  have  no  diamonds, 
nor  china,  nor  pictures,  nor  footmen,  then — but  all  to  be 
farmers?  I  am  not  saying  what  we  ought  to  do,  I  want 
only  to  show  you  with  perfect  clearness  first  what  we  are  do- 
ing ;  and  that,  I  repeat,  is  the  upshot  of  machine-contriving 
in  this  country.  And  observe  its  effect  on  the  national 
strength.  Without  machines,  you  have  a  hundred  and  fifty 
yeomen  ready  to  join  for  defence  of  the  land.  You  get  your 
machine,  starve  fifty  of  them,  make  diamond-cutters  or  foot- 
men of  as  many  more,  and  for  your  national  defence  against 
an  enemy,  you  have  now,  and  can  have,  only  fifty  men,  in- 
stead of  a  hundred  and  fifty  ;  these  also  now  with  minds 
much  alienated  from  you  as  their  chief,*  and  the  rest,  lapi- 
daries or  footmen  ;  and  a  steam  plough. 

That  is  one  effect  of  machinery ;  but  at  all  events,  if  we 
have  thus  lost  in  men,  we  have  gained  in  riches ;  instead 
of  happy  human  souls,  we  have  at  least  got  pictures,  china, 
horses,  and  are  ourselves  better  off  than  we  were  before. 
Bat  very  often,  and  in  much  of  our  machine-contriving,  even 
that  result  does  not  follow.  We  are  not  one  whit  the  richer 
for  the  machine,  we  only  employ  it  for  our  amusement.  For 
observe,  our  gaining  in  riches  depends  on  the  men  who  are 
out  of  employment  consenting  to  be  starved,  or  sent  out  of 
the  country.  But  suppose  they  do  not  consent  passively  to 
be  starved,  but  some  of  them  become  criminals,  and  have  to 
be  taken  charge  of  and  fed  at  a  much  greater  cost  than  if 

*  [They  were  deserting,  I  am  informed,  in  the  early  part  of  this  year, 
1873,  at  the  rate  of  a  regiment  a  week.  ] 


430 


THE  CROWN  OF  WILD  OLIVE. 


they  were  at  work,  and,  others,  paupers,  rioters,  and  the  like, 
then  you  attain  the  real  outcome  of  modern  wisdom  and  in- 
genuity. You  have  your  hundred  men  honestly  at  country 
work  ;  but  you  don't  like  the  sight  of  human  beings  in  your 
fields  ;  you  like  better  to  see  a  smoking  kettle.  You  pay,  as 
an  amateur,  for  that  pleasure,  and  you  employ  your  fifty  men 
in  picking  oakum,  or  begging,  rioting,  and  thieving. 

By  hand-labor,  therefore,  and  that  alone,  we  are  to  till 
the  ground.  By  hand  labor  also  to  plough  the  sea ;  both 
for  food,  and  in  commerce,  and  in  war:  not  with  floating 
kettles  there  neither,  but  with  hempen  bridle,  and  the  winds 
of  heaven  in  harness.  That  is  the  way  the  power  of  Greece 
rose  on  her  Egean,  the  power  of  Venice  on  her  Adria,  of 
Amalfi  in  her  blue  bay,  of  the  Norman  sea-riders  from  the 
North  Cape  to  Sicily  : — so,  your  own  dominion  also  of  the 
past.  Of  the  past  mind  you.  On  the  Baltic  and  the  Nile, 
your  power  is  already  departed.  By  machinery  you  would 
advance  to  discovery  ;  by  machinery  you  would  carry  your 
commerce  ; — you  would  be  engineers  instead  of  sailors  ;  and 
instantly  in  the  North  seas  you  are  beaten  among  the  ice, 
and  before  the  very  Gods  of  Nile,  beaten  among  the  sand. 
Agriculture,  then,  by  the  hand  or  by  the  plough  draw7n  only 
by  animals  ;  and  shepherd  and  pastoral  husbandry,  are  to  be 
the  chief  schools  of  Englishmen.  And  this  most  royal  acad- 
emy of  all  academies  you  have  to  open  over  all  the  land,  puri- 
fying your  heaths  and  hills,  and  waters,  and  keeping  them 
full  of  every  kind  of  lovely  natural  organism,  in  tree,  herb, 
and  living  creature.  All  land  that  is  waste  and  ugly,  you 
must  redeem  into  ordered  fruitfulness  ;  all  ruin,  desolateness, 
imperfectness  of  hut  or  habitation,  you  must  do  away  with  ; 
and  throughout  every  village  and  city  of  your  English  domin- 
ion there  must  not  be  a  hand  that  cannot  find  a  helper,  nor 
a  heart  that  cannot  find  a  comforter. 

"  How  impossible  !  "  I  know,  you  are  thinking.  Ah  !  So 
far  from  impossible,  it  is  easy,  it  is  natural,  it  is  necessary, 
and  I  declare  to  you  that,  sooner  or  later,  it  must  be  done,  at 
our  peril.  If  now  our  English  lords  of  land  will  fix  this  idea 
steadily  before  them  ;  take  the  people  to  their  hearts,  trust 


THE  FUTURE  OF  ENGLAND. 


431 


to  their  loyalty,  lead  their  labor  ; — then  indeed  there  will  be 
princes  again  in  the  midst  of  us,  worthy  of  the  island  throne, 

■  This  royal  throne  of  kings — this  sceptred  isle — 
This  fortress  built  by  nature  for  herself 
Against  infection,  and  the  hand  of  war  ; 
This  precious  stone  set  in  the  silver  sea; 
This  happy  breed  of  men — this  little  world : 
This  other  Eden — Demi-Paradise.  " 

But  if  they  refuse  to  do  this,  and  hesitate  and  equivocate, 
clutching  through  the  confused  catastrophe  of  all  things  only 
at  what  they  can  still  keep  stealthily  for  themselves — their 
doom  is  nearer  than  even  their  adversaries  hope,  and  it  will 
be  deeper  than  even  their  despisers  dream. 

That,  believe  me,  is  the  work  you  have  to  do  in  Eng- 
land ;  and  out  of  England  you  have  room  for  everything 
else  you  care  to  do.  Are  her  dominions  in  the  world  so  narrow 
that  she  can  find  no  place  to  spin  cotton  in  but  Yorkshire  ? 
We  may  organize  emigration  into  an  infinite  power.  We 
may  assemble  troops  of  the  more  adventurous  and  ambitious 
of  our  youth  ;  we  may  send  them  on  truest  foreign  service, 
founding  new  seats  of  authority,  and  centres  of  thought,  in 
uncultivated  and  unconquered  lands  ;  retaining  the  full  affec- 
tion to  the  native  country  no  less  in  our  colonists  than  in  our 
armies,  teaching  them  to  maintain  allegiance  to  their  father- 
land in  labor  no  less  than  in  battle  ;  aiding  them  with  free 
hand  in  the  prosecution  of  discovery,  and  the  victory  over 
adverse  natural  powers  ;  establishing  seats  of  every  manufact- 
ure in  the  climates  and  places  best  fitted  for  it,  and  bringing 
ourselves  into  due  alliance  and  harmony  of  skill  with  the  dex- 
terities of  every  race,  and  the  wisdoms  of  every  tradition  and 
every  tongue. 

And  then  you  may  make  England  itself  the  centre  of  the 
learning,  of  the  arts,  of  the  courtesies  and  felicities  of  the 
world.  You  may  cover  her  mountains  with  pasture  ;  her 
plains  with  corn,  her  valleys  with  the  lily,  and  her  gardens 
with  the  rose.    You  may  bring  together  there  in  peace  the 


432 


THE  CROWN  OB1  WILD  OLIVE. 


wise  and  the  pure,  and  the  gentle  of  the  earth,  and  by  their 
word,  command  through  its  farthest  darkness  the  birth  of 
"God's  first  creature,  which  was  Light."  You  know  whose 
words  those  are  ;  the  words  of  the  wisest  of  Englishmen.  He, 
and  with  him  the  wisest  of  all  other  great  nations,  have 
spoken  always  to  men  of  this  hope,  and  they  would  not  hear. 
Plato,  in  the  dialogue  of  Critias,  his  last,  broken  off  at  his 
death — Pindar,  in  passionate  singing  of  the  fortunate  islands 
— Virgil,  in  the  prophetic  tenth  eclogue — Bacon,  in  his  fable 
of  the  New  Atlantis — More,  in  the  book  which,  too  impa- 
tiently wise,  became  the  bye-word  of  fools — these,  all,  have 
told  us  with  one  voice  what  we  should  strive  to  attain ;  they 
not  hopeless  of  it,  but  for  our  follies  forced,  as  it  seems,  by 
heaven,  to  tell  us  only  partly  and  in  parables,  lest  we  should 
hear  them  and  obey. 

Shall  wTe  never  listen  to  the  words  of  these  wrisest  of  men  ? 
Then  listen  at  least  to  the  words  of  your  children — let  us  in 
the  lips  of  babes  and  sucklings  find  our  strength  ;  and  see 
that  we  do  not  make  them  mock  instead  of  pray,  when  we 
teach  them,  night  and  morning,  to  ask  for  what  we  believe 
never  can  be  granted  ; — that  the  will  of  the  Father, — which 
is,  that  His  creatures  may  be  righteous  and  happy — should 
be  done,  on  earth,  as  it  is  in  Heaven. 


NOTES 

ON  THE  POLITICAL  ECONOMY  OF  PRUSSIA 


NOTES  ON  THE  POLITICAL  ECON- 
OMY OF  PRUSSIA. 


I  am  often  accused  of  inconsistency ;  but  believe  myself 
defensible  against  the  charge  with  respect  to  what  I  have 
said  on  nearly  every  subject  except  that  of  war.  It  is  impos- 
sible for  me  to  write  consistently  of  war,  for  the  groups  of 
facts  I  have  gathered  about  it  lead  me  to  two  precisely  oppo- 
site conclusions. 

When  I  find  this  the  case,  in  other  matters,  I  am  silent,  till 
I  can  choose  my  conclusion  :  but,  with  respect  to  war,  I  am 
forced  to  speak,  by  the  necessities  of  the  time ;  and  forced  to 
act,  one  way  or  another.  The  conviction  on  which  I  act  is, 
that  it  causes  an  incalculable  amount  of  avoidable  human 
suffering,  and  that  it  ought  to  cease  among  Christian  nations ; 
and  if  therefore  any  of  my  boy-friends  desire  to  be  soldiers, 
I  try  my  utmost  to  bring  them  into  what  I  conceive  to  be  a 
better  mind.  But,  on  the  other  hand,  I  know  certainly  that 
the  most  beautiful  characters  yet  developed  among  men  have 
been  formed  in  war  ; — that  all  great  nations  have  been  war- 
rior nations,  and  that  the  only  kinds  of  peace  which  we  are 
likely  to  get  in  the  present  age  are  ruinous  alike  to  the  intel- 
lect, and  the  heart. 

The  lecture  on  "  War,"  in  this  volume,  addressed  to  young 
soldiers,  had  for  its  object  to  strengthen  their  trust  in  the  vir- 
tue of  their  profession.  It  is  inconsistent  with  itself,  in  its  clos- 
ing appeal  to  women,  praying  them  to  use  their  influence  to 
bring  wars  to  an  end.  And  I  have  been  hindered  from  com- 
pleting my  long  intended  notes  on  the  economy  of  the  Kings 
of  Prussia  by  continually  increasing  doubt  how  far  the  ma- 


436  THE  CROWN  OF  WILD  OLIVE. 

chinery  and  discipline  of  war,  under  which  they  learned  the 
art  of  government,  was  essential  for  such  lesson ;  and  what 
the  honesty  and  sagacity  of  the  Friedrich  who  so  nobly  re- 
paired his  ruined  Prussia,  might  have  done  for  the  happiness 
of  his  Prussia,  unruined. 

In  war,  however,  or  in  peace,  the  character  which  Carlyle 
chiefly  loves  him  for,  and  in  which  Carlyle  has  shown  him  to 
differ  from  all  kings  up  to  this  time  succeeding  him,  is  his 
constant  purpose  to  use  every  power  entrusted  to  him  for  the 
good  of  his  people  ;  and  be,  not  in  name  only,  but  in  heart 
and  hand,  their  king. 

Not  in  ambition,  but  in  natural  instinct  of  duty.  Fried- 
rich,  born  to  govern,  determines  to  govern  to  the  best  of  his 
faculty.  That  "best"  may  sometimes  be  unwise  ;  and  self- 
will,  or  love  of  glory,  may  have  their  oblique  hold  on  his 
mind,  and  warp  it  this  way  or  that ;  but  they  are  never  prin- 
cipal with  him.  He  believes  that  war  is  necessary,  and  main- 
tains it ;  sees  that  peace  is  necessary,  and  calmly  persists  in 
the  work  of  it  to  the  day  of  his  death,  not  claiming  therein 
more  praise  than  the  head  of  any  ordinary  household,  who 
rules  it  simply  because  it  is  his  place,  and  he  must  not  yield 
the  mastery  of  it  to  another. 

How  far,  in  the  future,  it  may  be  possible  for  men  to  gain 
the  strength  necessary  for  kingship  without  either  fronting 
death,  or  inflicting  it,  seems  to  me  not  at  present  determina- 
ble. The  historical  facts  are  that,  broadly  speaking,  none 
but  soldiers,  or  persons  with  a  soldierly  faculty,  have  ever 
yet  shown  themselves  fit  to  be  kings ;  and  that  no  other  men 
are  so  gentle,  so  just,  or  so  clear-sighted.  Wordsworth's 
character  of  the  happ}r  warrior  cannot  be  reached  in  the 
height  of  it  but  by  a  warrior  ;  nay,  so  much  is  it  beyond  com- 
mon strength  that  I  had  supposed  the  entire  meaning  of  it 
to  be  metaphorical,  until  one  of  the  best  soldiers  of  England 
himself  read  me  the  poem,*  and  taught  me,  what  I  might 
have  known,  had  I  enough  watched  his  own  life,  that  it  was 
entirely  literal.  There  is  nothing  of  so  high  reach  distinctly 
demonstrable  in  Friedrich  :  but  I  see  more  and  more,  ap  I 
*  The  late  Sir  Herbert  Edwardes. 


POLITICAL  ECONOMY  OF  PRUSSIA. 


437 


grow  older,  that  the  things  which  are  the  most  worth,  en- 
cumbered among  the  errors  and  faults  of  every  man's  nature, 
are  never  clearly  demonstrable  ;  and  are  often  most  forcible 
when  they  are  scarcely  distinct  to  his  own  conscience, — how 
much  less,  clamorous  for  recognition  by  others ! 

Nothing  can  be  more  beautiful  than  Carlyle's  showing  of 
this,  to  any  careful  reader  of  Priedrich.  But  careful  readers 
are  but  one  in  the  thousand  ;  and  by  the  careless,  the  masses 
of  detail  with  which  the  historian  must  deal  are  insurmount- 
able. 

My  own  notes,  made  for  the  special  purpose  of  hunting 
down  the  one  point  of  economy,  though  they  cruelly  spoil 
Carlyle's  own  current  and  method  of  thought,  may  yet  be  use- 
ful in  enabling  readers,  unaccustomed  to  books  involving  so 
vast  a  range  of  conception,  to  discern  what,  on  this  one  sub- 
ject only,  may  be  gathered  from  that  history.  On  any  other 
subject  of  importance,  similar  gatherings  might  be  made  of 
other  passages.    The  historian  has  to  deal  with  all  at  once. 

I  therefore  have  determined  to  print  here,  as  a  sequel  to  the 
Essay  on  War,  my  notes  from  the  first  volume  of  Friedrich, 
on  the  economies  of  Brandenburg,  up  to  the  date  of  the  estab- 
lishment of  the  Prussian  monarchy.  The  economies  of  the 
first  three  Kings  of  Prussia  I  shall  then  take  up  in  Fors 
Clavigera,  finding  them  fitter  for  examination  in  connection 
with  the  subject  of  that  book  than  of  this. 

I  assume,  that  the  reader  will  take  down  his  first  volume  of 
Carlyle,  and  read  attentively  the  passages  to  which  I  refer  him. 
I  give  the  reference  first  to  the  largest  edition,  in  six  volumes 
(1858-1865)  ;  then,  in  parenthesis,  to  the  smallest  or  "people's 
edition"  (1872-1873).  The  pieces  which  I  have  quoted  in  my 
own  text  are  for  the  use  of  readers  who  may  not  have  ready 
access  to  the  book  ;  and  are  enough  for  the  explanation  of  the 
points  to  which  I  wish  them  to  direct  their  thoughts  in  read- 
ing such  histories  of  soldiers  or  soldier-kingdoms. 


438 


THE  CRO  WN  OF  WILD  OLIVE. 


I. 

Year  928  to  936. — Dawn  of  Order  in  Christian  Germany. 
Book  II.  Chap.  i.  p.  67  (47). 

Henry  the  Fowler,  "  the  beginning  of  German  kings,"  is  a 
mighty  soldier  in  the  cause  of  peace  ;  his  essential  work  the 
building  and  organization  of  fortified  towns  for  the  protection 
of  men. 

Read  page  72  with  utmost  care  (51),  "He  fortified  towns," 
to  end  of  small  print.  I  have  added  some  notes  on  the  matter 
in  my  lecture  on  Giovanni  Pisano  ;  but  whether  you  can  glance 
at  them  or  not,  fix  in  your  mind  this  institution  of  truly  civil 
or  civic  building  in  Germany,  as  distinct  from  the  building  of 
baronial  castles  for  the  security  of  robbers :  and  of  a  standing 
army  consisting  of  every  ninth  man,  called  a  "  burgher M 
("  townsman") — a  soldier,  appointed  to  learn  that  profession 
that  he  may  guard  the  walls — the  exact  reverse  of  our  notion 
of  a  burgher. 

Frederick's  final  idea  of  his  army  is,  indeed,  only  this. 

Brannibor,  a  chief  fortress  of  the  Wends,  is  thus  taken,  and 
further  strengthened  by  Henry  the  Fowler ;  wardens  appoint- 
ed for  it ;  and  thus  the  history  of  Brandenburg  begins.  On 
all  frontiers,  also,  this  "beginning  of  German  kings"  has 
his  "Markgraf."  "Ancient  of  the  marked  place."  Bead 
page  73,  measuredly,  learning  it  by  heart,  if  it  may  be.  (51- 
2.) 

It 

936-1000. — History  of  Nascent  Brandenburg. 

The  passage  I  last  desired  you  to  read  ends  with  this  sen- 
tence: "The  sea-wall  you  build,  and  what  main  floodgates 
you  establish  in  it,  will  depend  on  the  state  of  the  outer 
sea." 

From  this  time  forward  you  have  to  keep  clearly  separate 


POLITICAL  ECONOMY  OF  PRUSSIA. 


439 


in  your  minds,  (a)  the  history  of  that  outer  sea,  Pagan  Scan- 
dinavia, Russia,  and  Bor-Bussia,  or  Prussia  proper ;  (b)  the 
history  of  Henry  the  Fowler's  Eastern  and  Western  Marches ; 
asserting  themselves  gradually  as  Austria  and  the  Nether- 
lands ;  and  (c)  the  history  of  this  inconsiderable  fortress  of 
Brandenburg,  gradually  becoming  considerable,  and  the  cap- 
ital city  of  increasing  district  between  them.  That  last  his- 
tory, however,  Carlyle  is  obliged  to  leave  vague  and  gray  for 
two  hundred  years  after  Henry's  death.  Absolutely  dim  for 
the  first  century,  in  which  nothing  is  evident  but  that  its 
wardens  or  Markgraves  had  no  peaceable  possession  of  the 
place.  Bead  the  second  paragraph  in  page  74  (52-3),  "in 
old  books"  to  "reader,"  and  the  first  in  page  83  (59)  "mean- 
while" to  "substantial,"  consecutively.  They  bring  the 
story  of  Brandenburg  itself  down,  at  any  rate,  from  936  to 
1000. 

m 

936-1000.— State  of  the  Outer  Sea. 

Read  now  Chapter  II.  beginning  at  page  76  (54),  wherein 
you  will  get  account  of  the  beginning  of  vigorous  missionary 
work  on  the  outer  sea,  in  Prussia  proper  ;  of  the  death  of  St. 
Adalbert,  and  of  the  purchase  of  his  dead  body  by  the  Duke 
of  Poland. 

You  will  not  easily  understand  Carlyle 's  laugh  in  this  chap- 
ter, unless  you  have  learned  yourself  to  laugh  in  sadness,  and 
to  laugh  in  love. 

"No  Czech  blows  his  pipe  in  the  woodlands  without  certain 
precautions  and  preliminary  fuglings  of  a  devotional  nature." 
(Imagine  St.  Adalbert,  in  spirit,  at  the  railway  station  in 
Birmingham  !) 

My  own  main  point  for  notice  in  the  chapter  is  the  pur- 
chase of  his  body  for  its  "weight  in  gold."  Swindling  angels 
held  it  up  in  the  scales ;  it  did  not  weigh  so  much  as  a  web 
of  gossamer.  "Had  such  excellent  odor,  too,  and  came  for 
a  mere  nothing  of  gold,"  says  Carlyle.  It  is  one  of  the  first 
commercial  transactions  of  Germany,  but  I  regret  the  con- 


440 


THE  CROWN  OF  WILD  OLIVE. 


duct  of  the  angels  on  the  occasion.  Evangelicalism  has  been 
proud  of  ceasing  to  invest  in  relics,  its  swindling  angels  help- 
ing it  to  better  things,  as  it  supposes.  For  my  own  part,  I 
believe  Christian  Germany  could  not  have  bought  at  this 
time  any  treasure  more  precious ;  nevertheless,  the  missionary 
work  itself  you  find  is  wholly  vain.  The  difference  of  opinion 
between  St.  Adalbert  and  the  Wends,  on  Divine  matters, 
does  not  signify  to  the  Fates.  They  will  not  have  it  disputed 
about ;  and  end  the  dispute  adversely,  to  St.  Adalbert — ad- 
versely, even,  to  Brandenburg  and  its  civilizing  power,  as  you 
will  immediately  see. 

IV. 

1000-1030. — History  of  Brandenburg  in  Trouble. 
Book  II.  Chap.  ih\  p.  83  (59). 

The  adventures  of  Brandenburg  in  contest  with  Pagan 
Prussia,  irritated,  rather  than  amended,  by  St.  Adalbert.  In 
1023,  roughly,  a  hundred  years  after  Henry  the  Fowler's 
death,  Brandenburg  is  taken  by  the  Wends,  and  its  first  line 
of  Markgraves  ended  ;  its  population  mostly  butchered,  espe- 
cially the  priests;  and  the  Wends'  God,  Triglaph,  "some- 
thing like  three  whales'  cubs  combined  by  boiling,"  set  up  on 
the  top  of  St.  Mary's  Hill. 

Here  is  an  adverse  "Doctrine  of  the  Trinity"  which  has 
its  supporters  !  It  is  wonderful, — this  Tripod  and  Triglyph 
— three  footed,  three-cut  faith  of  the  North  and  South,  the 
leaf  of  the  oxalis,  and  strawberry,  and  clover,  fostering  the 
same  in  their  simple  manner.  I  suppose  it  to  be  the  most 
savage  and  natural  of  notions  about  Deity ;  a  prismatic 
idol- shape  of  Him,  rude  as  a  triangular  log,  as  a  trefoil  grass. 
I  do  not  find  how  long  Triglaph  held  his  state  on  St.  Mary's 
Hill.  "For  a  time,"  says  Carlyle,  "the  priests  all  slain  or 
fled — shadowy  Markgraves  the  like — church  and  state  lay  in 
ashes,  and  Triglaph,  like  a  triple  porpoise  under  the  influence 
of  laudanum,  stood,  I  know  not  whether  on  his  head  or  his 
tail,  aloft  on  the  Harlungsberg,  as  the  Supreme  of  this  Uni- 
verse for  the  time  being. " 


POLITICAL  ECONOMY  OF  PRUSSIA. 


441 


V. 

,1030-1130. — Brandenburg  under  the  Ditmarsch  Markgraves, 
or  Ditmarsch-Stade  Markgraves. 

Book  II.  Chap.  iii.  p.  85  (60). 

Or  Anglish,  or  Saxon  breed.  They  attack  Brandenburg, 
under  its  Triglyphic  protector,  take  it — dethrone  him,  and 
hold  the  town  for  a  hundred  years,  their  history  "  stamped 
beneficially  on  the  face  of  things,  Markgraf  after  Markgraf 
getting  killed  in  the  business.  'Erschlagen,'  '  slain/  fight- 
ing with  the  Heathen — say  the  old  books,  and  pass  on  to  an- 
other.'' If  we  allow  seven  years  to  Triglaph — we  get  a  clear 
century  for  these— as  above  indicated.  They  die  out  in 
1130. 

VI. 

1130-1170. — Brandenburg  under  Albert  the  Bear. 
Book  II.  Chap  iv.  p.  91  (64). 

He  is  the  first  of  the  Ascanien  Markgraves,  whose  castle  of 
Ascanica  is  on  the  northern  slope  of  the  Hartz  Mountains, 
"  ruins  still  dimly  traceable." 

There  had  been  no  soldier  or  king  of  note  among  the  Dit- 
marsch Markgraves,  so  that  you  will  do  well  to  fix  in  your 
mind  successively  the  three  men,  Henry  the  Fowler,  St.  Adal- 
bert, and  Albert  the  Bear.  A  soldier  again,  and  a  strong  one. 
Named  the  Bear  only  from  the  device  on  his  shield,  first 
wholly  definite  Markgraf  of  Brandenburg  that  there  is,  "  and 
that  the  luckiest  of  events  for  Brandenburg. "  Read  page 
93  (66)  carefully,  and  note  this  of  his  economies. 

Nothing  better  is  known  to  me  of  Albert  the  Bear  than  his 
introducing  large  numbers  of  Dutch  Netherlander  into  those 
countries ;  men  thrown  out  of  work,  who  already  knew  how 


442  THE  CROWN  OF  WILD  OLIVE. 

to  deal  with  bog  and  sand,  by  mixing  and  delving,  and  who 
first  taught  Brandenburg  what  greenness  and  cow-pasture 
was.  The  Wends,  in  presence  of  such  things,  could  not  but 
consent  more  and  more  to  efface  themselves — either  to  be- 
come German,  and  grow  milk  and  cheese  in  the  Dutch  man- 
ner, or  to  disappear  from  the  world. 

After  two-hundred  and  fifty  years  of  barking  and  worry- 
ing, the  Wends  are  now  finally  reduced  to  silence ;  their 
anarchy  well  buried  and  wholesome  Dutch  cabbage  planted 
over  it ;  Albert  did  several  great  things  in  the  world ;  but 
this,  for  posterity,  remains  his  memorable  feat.  Not  done 
quite  easily,  but  done  :  big  destinies  of  nations  or  of  persons 
are  not  founded  gratis  in  this  world,  He  had  a  sore,  toil- 
some time  of  it,  coercing,  warring,  managing  among  his  fel- 
low-creatures, while  his  day's  work  lasted — fifty  years  or  so, 
for  it  began  early.  He  died  in  his  castle  of  Ballenstadt, 
peaceably  among  the  Hartz  Mountains  at  last,  in  the  year 
1170,  age  about  sixty-five. 

Now,  note  in  all  this  the  steady  gain  of  soldiership  enforc- 
ing order  and  agriculture,  with  St.  Adalbert  giving  higher 
strain  to  the  imagination.  Henry  the  Fowler  establishes 
walled  towns,  fighting  for  mere  peace.  Albert  the  Bear  plants 
the  country  with  cabbages,  fighting  for  his  cabbage-fields. 
And  the  disciples  of  St.  Adalbert,  generally,  have  succeeded 
in  substituting  some  idea  of  Christ  for  the  idea  of  Triglaph. 
Some  idea  only  ;  other  ideas  than  of  Christ  haunt  even  to 
this  day  those  Hartz  Mountains  among  which  Albert  the  Bear 
dies  so  peacefully.  Mephistopheles,  and  all  his  ministers, 
inhabit  there,  commanding  mephitic  clouds  and  earth-born 
dreams. 


POLITICAL  ECONOMY  OF  PRUSSIA.  443 


VII. 

1170-1320. — Brandenburg   150  years  under  the  Ascanien 

Markgraves. 

Vol.  I.  Book  II.  Chap.  viii.  p.  135  (96). 

"  Wholesome  Dutch  cabbages  continued  to  be  more  and 
more  planted  by  them  in  the  waste  sand :  intrusive  chaos,  and 
Triglaph  held  at  bay  by  them,"  till  at  last  in  1240,  seventy 
years  after  the  great  Bear's  death,  they  fortify  a  new  Burg,  a 
"  little  rampart,"  Wehrlin,  diminutive  of  Wehr  (or  vallum), 
gradually  smoothing  itself,  with  a  little  echo  of  the  Bear  in  it 
too,  into  Ber-lin,  the  oily  river  Spree  flowing  by,  "  in  which 
you  catch  various  fish  ;  "  while  trade  over  the  flats  and  by  the 
dull  streams,  is  widely  possible.  Of  the  Ascanien  race,  the 
notablest  is  Otto  with  the  Arrow,  whose  story  see,  pp.  138- 
141  (98-100),  noting  that  Otto  is  one  of  the  first  Minnesing- 
ers ;  that,  being  a  prisoner  to  the  Archbishop  of  Magdeburg, 
his  wife  rescues  him,  selling  her  jewels  to  bribe  the  canons  ; 
and  that  the  Knight,  set  free  on  parole  and  promise  of  farther 
ransom,  rides  back  with  his  own  price  in  his  hand ;  holding 
himself  thereat  cheaply  bought,  though  no  angelic  legerde- 
main happens  to  the  scales  now.  His  own  estimate  of  his 
price — "Kain  gold  ducats  on  my  war-horse  and  me,  till  you 
cannot  see  the  point  of  my  spear  atop." 

Emptiness  of  utter  pride,  you  think  ? 

Not  so.  Consider  with  yourself,  reader,  how  much  you 
dare  to  say,  aloud,  you  are  worth.  If  you  have  no  courage  to 
name  any  price  whatsoever  for  yourself,  believe  me,  the 
cause  is  not  your  modesty,  but  that  in  very  truth  you  feel  in 
your  heart  there  would  be  no  bid  for  you  at  Lucian's  sale  of 
lives,  were  that  again  possible,  at  Christie  and  Manson's. 

Finally  (1319  exactly  ;  say  1320,  for  memory),  the  Ascanien 
line  expired  in  Brandenburg,  and  the  little  town  and  its 
electorate  lapsed  to  the  Kaiser  :  meantime  other  economical 
arrangements  had  been  in  progress  ;  but  observe  first  how  far 
we  have  got. 


4J4  THE  GROWN  OF  WILD  OLIVE. 

The  Fowler,  St.  Adalbert  and  the  Bear  have  established 
order,  and  some  sort  of  Christianity  ;  but  the  established 
persons  begin  to  think  somewhat  too  well  of  themselves.  On 
quite  honest  terms,  a  dead  saint  or  a  living  knight  ought  to 
be  worth  their  true  "  weight  in  gold."  But  a  pyramid,  with 
only  the  point  of  the  spear  seen  at  top,  would  be  many  times 
over  one's  weight  in  gold.  And  although  men  were  yet  far 
enough  from  the  notion  of  modern  days,  that  the  gold  is 
better  than  the  flesh,  and  from  buying  it  with  the  clay  of 
one's  body,  and  even  the  fire  of  one's  soul,  instead  of  soul 
and  body  with  it,  they  were  beginning  to  fight  for  their  own 
supremacy,  or  for  their  own  religious  fancies,  and  not  at  all 
to  any  useful  end,  until  an  entirely  unexpected  movement  is 
made  in  the  old  useful  direction  forsooth,  only  by  some 
kind  ship-captains  of  Ltibeck ! 

VIIL 

1210-1320. — Civil  work,  aiding  military,  during  the  Ascanien 

period. 

Vol.  I.  Book  II.  Chap.  vi.  p.  109  (77). 

In  the  year  1190,  Acre  not  yet  taken,  and  the  crusading  army 
wasting  by  murrain  on  the  shore,  the  German  soldiers  es- 
pecially having  none  to  look  after  them,  certain  compassion- 
ate ship-captains  of  Lubeck,  one  Walpot  von  Bassenheim  tak- 
ing the  lead,  formed  themselves  into  an  union  for  succor  of 
the  sick  and  the  dying,  set  up  canvas  tents  from  the  Lubeck 
ship  stores,  and  did  what  utmost  was  in  them  silently  in  the 
name  of  mercy  and  heaven.  Finding  its  work  prosper,  the 
little  medicinal  and  weather-fending  company  took  vows  on 
itself,  strict  chivalry  forms,  and  decided  to  become  permanent 
"  Knights  Hospitallers  of  our  dear  Lady  of  Mount  Zion," 
separate  from  the  former  Knights  Hospitallers,  as  being  en- 
tirely German  :  yet  soon,  as  the  German  Order  of  St.  Mary, 
eclipsing  in  importance  Templars,  Hospitallers,  and  every 
other  chivalric  order  then  extant  ;  no  purpose  of  battle  in 
them,  but  much  strength  for  it ;  their  purpose  only  the  help- 


POLITICAL  ECONOMY  OF  PRUSSIA. 


445 


ing  of  German  pilgrims.  To  this  only  they  are  bound  by 
their  vow,  "geliibde,''  and  become  one  of  the  usefullest  of 
clubs  in  all  the  Pall  Mall  of  Europe. 

Finding  pilgrimage  in  Palestine  falling  slack,  and  more 
need  for  them  on  the  homeward  side  of  the  sea,  their  Hoch- 
meister,  Hermann  of  the  Salza,  goes  over  to  Venice  in  1210. 
There  the  titular  bishop  of  still  unconverted  Preussen  advises 
him  of  that  field  of  work  for  his  idle  knights.  Hermann 
thinks  well  of  it :  sets  his  St.  Mary's  riders  at  Triglaph,  with 
the  sword  in  one  hand  and  a  missal  in  the  other. 

Not  your  modern  way  of  affecting  conversion  !  Too  illib- 
eral, you  think  ;  and  what  wTould  Mr.  J.  S.  Mill  say  ? 

But  if  Triglaph  had  been  verily  "  three  whales'  cubs 
combined  by  boiling, "  you  would  yourself  have  promoted 
attack  upon  him  for  the  sake  of  his  oil,  would  not  you  ?  The 
Teutsch  Hitters,  fighting  him  for  charity,  are  they  so  much 
inferior  to  you  ? 

They  built,  and  burnt,  innumerable  stockades  for  and 
against ;  built  wooden  forts  which  are  now  stone  towns.  They 
fought  much  and  prevalently  ;  galloped  desperately  to  and  fro, 
ever  on  the  alert.  In  peaceabler  ulterior  times,  they  fenced 
in  the  Nogat  and  the  Weichsel  with  dams,  whereby  unlimited 
quagmire  might  become  grassy  meadow — as  it  continues  to 
this  day.  Marie u burg  (Mary's  Burg),  with  its  grand  stone 
Schloss  still  visible  and  even  habitable :  this  was  at  length 
their  headquarter.  But  how  many  Burgs  of  wood  and  stone 
they  built,  in  different  parts ;  what  revolts,  surprisals,  furious 
fights  in  woody,  boggy  places  they  had,  no  man  has  counted. 

But  always  some  preaching  by  zealous  monks,  accompanied 
the  chivalrous  fighting.  And  colonists  came  in  from  Germany  ; 
trickling  in,  or  at  times  streaming.  Victorious  Eitterdom 
offers  terms  to  the  beaten  heathen :  terms  not  of  tolerant 
nature,  but  which  will  be  punctually  kept  by  Eitterdom.  When 
the  flame  of  revolt  or  general  conspiracy  burnt  up  again  too 
extensively,  high  personages  came  on  crusade  to  them.  Otto- 
car,  King  of  Bohemia,  with  his  extensive  far-shining  chivalry, 
"  conquered  Samland  in  a  month  ; "  tore  up  the  Eomova  where 
Adalbert  had  been  massacred,  and  burned  it  from  the  face  of 
the  earth.  A  certain  fortress  was  founded  at  that  time,  in 
Ottocar  s  presence  ;  and  in  honor  of  him  they  named  it  King's 


44G 


THE  GROWN  OF  WILD  OLIVE. 


Portress,  "  Konigsberg."  Among  King  Ottocar's  esquires, 
or  subaltern  junior  officials,  on  this  occasion,  is  one  Budolf, 
heir  of  a  poor  Swiss  lordship  and  gray  hill  castle,  called 
Hapsburg,  rather  in  reduced  circumstances,  whom  Ottocar 
likes  for  his  prudent,  hardy  ways  ;  a  stout,  modest,  wise 
young  man,  who  may  chance  to  redeem  Hapsburg  a  little,  if 
he  lives. 

Conversion,  and  complete  conquest  once  come,  there  was  a 
happy  time  for  Prussia  ;  ploughshare  instead  of  sword  :  busy 
sea-havens,  German  towns,  getting  built ;  churches  everywhere 
rising  ;  grass  growing,  and  peaceable  cows,  where  formerly  had 
been  quagmire  and  snakes,  and  for  the  Order  a  happy  time. 
On  the  whole,  this  Teutsch  Bittcrdom,  for  the  first  century 
and  more,  was  a  grand  phenomenon,  and  flamed  like  a  bright 
blessed  beacon  through  the  night  of  things,  in  those  Northern 
countries.  For  above  a  century,  we  perceive,  it  was  the  rally- 
ing place  of  all  brave  men  who  had  a  career  to  seek  on  terms 
other  than  vulgar.  The  noble  soul,  aiming  beyond  money, 
and  sensible  to  more  than  hunger  in  this  world,  had  a  beacon 
burning  (as  we  say),  if  the  night  chanced  to  overtake  it,  and 
the  earth  to  grow  too  intricate,  as  is  not  uncommon.  Bet- 
ter than  the  career  of  stump-oratory,  I  should  fancy,  and  its 
Hesperides  apples,  golden,  and  of  gilt  horse-dung.  Better  than 
puddling  away  one's  poor  spiritual  gift  of  God  (loan,  not  gift), 
such  as  it  may  be,  in  building  the  lofty  rhyme,  the  lofty  re- 
view article,  for  a  discerning  public  that  has  sixpence  to  spare  ! 
Times  alter  greatly.* 

We  must  pause  here  again  for  a  moment  to  think  where  we 
are,  and  who  is  with  us.  The  Teutsch  Hitters  have  been  fight- 
iug,  independently  of  all  states,  for  their  own  hand,  or  St. 
Adalbert's ;  partly  for  mere  love  of  fight,  partly  for  love  of 
order,  partly  for  love  of  God.  Meantime,  other  Eiders  have 
been  fighting  wholly  for  what  they  could  get  by  it ;  and  other 
persons,  not  Eiders,  have  not  been  fighting  at  all,  but  in  their 
own  towns  peacefully  manufacturing  and  selling. 

Of  Henry  the  Fowler's  Marches,  Austria  has  become  a  mili- 
tary power,  Flanders  a  mercantile  one,  pious  only  in  the  degree 
consistent  with  their  several  occupations.    Prussia  is  now  a 

*  I  would  much  rather  print  these  passages  of  Carlyle  in  large  golden 
letters  than  small  black  ones  ;  but  they  are  only  here  at  all  for  unlucky 
people  who  can't  read  them  with  the  context. 


POLITICAL  ECONOMY  OF  PRUSSIA. 


447 


practical  and  farming  country,  more  Christian  than  its  longer- 
converted  neighbors. 

Towns  are  built,  Konigsberg  (King  Ottocar's  town),  Thoren 
(Thorn,  City  of  the  Gates),  with  many  others  ;  so  that  the  wild 
population  and  the  tame  now  lived  tolerably  together,  under 
Gospel  and  Ltibeck  law  ;  and  all  was  ploughing  and  trading. 

But  Brandenburg  itself,  what  of  it? 

The  Ascanien  Markgraves  rule  it  on  the  whole  prosperously 
down  to  1320,  when  their  line  expires,  and  it  falls  into  the 
power  of  Imperial  Austria. 

IX. 

1320-1415. — Brandenburg  under  the  Austrians. 

A  century — the  fourteenth — of  miserable  anarchy  and  de- 
cline for  Brandenburg,  its  Kurfursts,  in  deadly  succession, 
making  what  they  can  out  of  it  for  their  own  pockets.  The 
city  itself  and  its  territory  utterly  helpless.  Read  pp.  180, 181 
(129,  130).  "  The  towns  suffered  much,  any  trade  they  might 
have  had  going  to  wreck.  Robber  castles  flourished,  all  else 
decayed,  no  highway  safe.  What  are  Hamburg  pedlars  made 
for  but  to  be  robbed?" 

X. 

1415-1440. — Brandenburg  under  Friedrich  of  Nuremberg. 

This  is  the  fourth  of  the  men  whom  you  are  to  remember  as 
creators  of  the  Prussian  monarchy,  Henry  the  Fowler,  St. 
Adalbert,  Albert  the  Bear,  of  Ascanien,  and  Friedrich  of  Nu- 
remberg ;  (of  Hohenzollern,  by  name,  and  by  country,  of  the 
Black  Forest,  north  of  the  Lake  of  Constance). 

Brandenburg  is  sold  to  him  at  Constance,  during  the  great 
Council,  for  about  200,000/.  of  our  money,  worth  perhaps 
a  million  in  that  day;  still,  with  its  capabilities,  "dog 
cheap/'    Admitting,  what  no  one  at  the  time  denied,  the  gen- 


448  THE  CROWN  OF  WILD  OLIVE. 

eral  niarketableness  of  states  as  private  property,  this  is  the 
one  practical  result,  thinks  Carlyle  (not  likely  to  think 
wrong),  of  that  oecumenical  deliberation,  four  years  long,  of 
the  ' '  elixir  of  the  intellect  and  dignity  of  Europe.  And  that 
one  thing  was  not  its  doing ;  but  a  pawnbroking  job,  inter- 
calated/' putting,  however,  at  last,  Brandenburg  again  under 
the  will  of  one  strong  man.  On  St.  John's  day,  1412,  he  first 
set  foot  in  his  town,  "  and  Brandenburg,  under  its  wise  Kur- 
fiirst,  begins  to  be  cosmic  again."  The  story  of  Heavy  Peg, 
pages  195-198  (138,  140),  is  one  of  the  most  brilliant  and  im- 
portant passages  of  the  first  volume  ;  page  199,  specially  to 
our  purpose,  must  be  given  entire  : — 

The  offer  to  be  Kaiser  was  made  him  in  his  old  days  ;  but 
he  wisely  declined  that  too.  It  was  in  Brandenburg,  by 
what  he  silently  founded  there,  that  he  did  his  chief  benefit 
to  Germany  and  mankind.  He  understood  the  noble  art  of 
governing  men  ;  had  in  him  the  justness,  clearness,  valor, 
and  patience  needed  for  that.  A  man  of  sterling  probity,  for 
one  thing.  Which  indeed  is  the  first  requisite  in  said  art : — if 
you  will  have  your  laws  obeyed  without  mutiny,  see  well  that 
they  be  pieces  of  God  Almighty's  law  ;  otherwise  all  the  ar- 
tillery in  the  world  will  not  keep  down  mutiny. 

Friedrich  '  6  travelled  much  over  Brandenburg;"  looking 
into  everything  with  his  own  eyes  ;  making,  I  can  well  fancy, 
innumerable  crooked  things  straight  ;  reducing  more  and 
more  that  famishing  dog-kennel  of  a  Brandenburg  into  a 
fruitful  arable  field.  His  portraits  represent  a  square-headed, 
mild-looking,  solid  gentleman,  with  a  certain  twinkle  of  mirth 
in  the  serious  eyes  of  him.  Except  in  those  Hussite  wars  for 
Kaiser  Sigismund  and  the  Beich,  in  which  no  man  could  pros- 
per, he  may  be  defined  as  constantly  prosperous.  To  Bran- 
denburg he  was,  very  literally,  the  blessing  of  blessings ;  re- 
demption out  of  death  into  life.  In  the  ruins  of  that  old 
Friesack  Castle,  battered  down  by  Heavy  Peg,  antiquarian 
science  (if  it  had  any  eyes)  might  look  for  the  taproot  of  the 
Prussian  nation,  and  the  beginning  of  all  that  Brandenburg 
has  since  grown  to  under  the  sun. 

Which  growth  is  now  traced  by  Carlyle  in  its  various  bud- 
ding and  withering,  under  the  succession  of  the  twelve  Elec- 


POLITICAL  ECONOMY  OF  PRUSSIA. 


449 


tors,  of  whom  Friedrich,  with  his  heavy  Peg,  is  first,  and 
Friedrich,  first  King  of  Prussia,  grandfather  of  Friedrich  the 
Great,  the  twelfth. 

XL 

1415-1701. — Brandenburg  under  the  Hohenzollem  Kurfiirsts. 

Book  III. 

Who  the  Hohenzollerns  were,  and  how  they  came  to  power 
in  Nuremberg,  is  told  in  Chap.  v.  of  Book  II. 

Their  succession  in  Brandenburg  is  given  in  brief  at  page 
377  (269).  I  copy  it,  in  absolute  barrenness  of  enumeration, 
for  our  momentary  convenience,  here  : 

Friedrich  1st  of  Brandenburg  (6th  of  Nuremberg),  .  1412-1440 


Friedrich  II.,  called  44  Iron  Teeth,"        .       .  .1440-1472 

Albert,   1472-1486 

Johann,   1486-1499 

Joachim  I,   1499-1535 

Joachim  II,   1535-1571 

Johann  George,   1571-1598 

Joachim  Friedrich,   1598-1608 

Johann  Sigismund,   1608-1619 

George  Wilhelm,                                                 .  1619-1640 

Friedrich  Wilhelm  (the  Great  Elector),  .       .       .  1640-1688 

Friedrich,  first  King ;  crowned  18th  January,        .  1701 


Of  this  line  of  princes  we  have  to  say  they  followed  gener- 
ally in  their  ancestor's  steps,  and  had  success  of  the  like  kind 
more  or  less  ;  Hohenzollerns  all  of  them,  by  character  and  be- 
haviour as  well  as  by  descent.  No  lack  of  quiet  energy,  of 
thrift,  sound  sense.  There  was  likewise  solid  fair-play  in 
general,  no  founding  of  yourself  on  ground  that  will  not 
carry,  and  there  was  instant,  gentle,  but  inexorable  crushing  of 
mutiny,  if  it  showed  itself,  which  after  the  Second  Elector,  or 
at  most  the  Third,  it  had  altogether  ceased  to  do. 

This  is  the  general  account  of  them  ;  of  special  matters 
note  the  following : — 

II.  Friedrich,  called  "Iron- teeth,"  from  his  firmness,  proves 


450 


THE  CROWN  OF  WILD  OLIVE. 


a  notable  manager  and  governor.  Builds  the  palace  at  Ber~ 
lin  in  its  first  form,  and  makes  it  his  chief  residence.  Buys 
Neumark  from  the  fallen  Teutsch  Bitters,  and  generally  es- 
tablishes things  on  securer  footing. 

III.  Albert,  "  a  fiery,  tough  old  Gentlemen,"  called  the 
Achilles  of  Germany  in  his  day ;  has  half-a-century  of  fight- 
ing with  his  own  Niirembergers,  with  Bavaria,  France,  Bur- 
gundy, and  its  fiery  Charles,  besides  being  head  constable  to 
the  Kaiser  among  any  disorderly  persons  in  the  East.  His 
skull,  long  shown  on  his  tomb,  "  marvellous  for  strength  and 
with  no  visible  sutures." 

IV.  John,  the  orator  of  his  race  ;  (but  the  orations  unre- 
corded). His  second  son,  Archbishop  of  Maintz,  for  whose 
piece  of  memorable  work  see  page  223  (143)  and  read  in  con- 
nection with  that  the  history  of  Margraf  George,  pp.  237- 
241  (152-154),  and  the  8th  chapter  of  the  third  book. 

V.  Joachim  L,  of  little  note  ;  thinks  there  has  been  enough 
Reformation,  and  checks  proceedings  in  a  dull  stubbornness, 
causing  him  at  least  grave  domestic  difficulties. — Page  271 
(173). 

VI.  Joachim  II.  Again  active  in  the  Reformation,  and 
staunch, 

though  generally  in  a  cautious,  weighty,  never  in  a  rash, 
swift  way,  to  the  great  cause  of  Protestantism  and  to  all 
good  causes.  He  was  himself  a  solemnly  devout  man  ;  deep, 
awe-stricken  reverence  dwelling  in  his  view  of  this  universe. 
Most  serious,  though  with  a  jocose  dialect,  commonly  having 
a  cheerful  wit  in  speaking  to  men.  Luther's  books  he  called 
his  Seelenschatz,  (soul's  treasure) ;  Luther  and  the  Bible  were 
his  chief  reading.  Fond  of  profane  learning,  too,  and  of  the 
useful  or  ornamental  arts ;  given  to  music,  and  "  would  him- 
self sing  aloud  "  when  he  had  a  melodious  leisure  hour. 

VII.  Johann  George,  a  prudent  thrifty  Herr ;  no  mistresses, 
no  luxuries  allowed ;  at  the  sight  of  a  new-fashioned  coat 
he  would  fly  out  on  an  unhappy  youth  and  pack  him  from 
his  presence.  Very  strict  in  point  of  justice  ;  a  peasant  once 
appealing  to  him  in  one  of  his  inspection  journeys  through 
the  country — 


POLITICAL  ECONOMY  OF  PRUSSIA.  451 


"  Grant  me  justice,  Durchlaucht,  against  so  and  so  ;  I  am 
your  Highness's  born  subject. "  "  Thou  sliouldst  have  it,  man, 
wert  thou  a  born  Turk  !  "  answered  Johann  George. 

Thus,  generally,  we  find  this  line  of  Electors  representing 
in  Europe  the  Puritan  mind  of  England  in  a  somewhat  duller, 
but  less  dangerous,  form ;  receiving  what  Protestantism 
could  teach  of  honesty  and  common  sense,  but  not  its  anti- 
Catholic  fury,  or  its  selfish  spiritual  anxiety.  Pardon  of  sins 
is  not  to  be  had  from  Tetzel ;  neither,  the  Hohenzollern  mind 
advises  with  itself,  from  even  Tetzel's  master,  for  either  the 
buying,  or  the  asking.  On  the  whole,  we  had  better  commit 
as  few  as  possible,  and  live  just  lives  and  plain  ones. 

A  conspicuous  thrift,  veracity,  modest  solidity,  looks  through 
the  conduct  of  this  Herr ;  a  determined  Protestant  he  too,  as 
indeed  all  the  following  were  and  are. 

VIII.  Joachim  Friedrich.  Gets  hold  of  Prussia,  which 
hitherto,  you  observe,  has  always  been  spoken  of  as  a  separate 
country  from  Brandenburg.  March  11,  1605 — "squeezed  his 
way  into  the  actual  guardianship  of  Preussen  and  its  imbe- 
cile Duke,  which  was  his  by  right." 

For  my  own  part,  I  do  not  trouble  myself  much  about 
these  rights,  never  being  able  to  make  out  any  single  one,  to 
begin  with,  except  the  right  to  keep  everything  and  every 
place  about  you  in  as  good  order  as  you  can — Prussia,  Po- 
land, or  what  else.  I  should  much  like,  for  instance,  just 
now,  to  hear  of  any  honest  Cornish  gentleman  of  the  old 
Drake  breed  taking  a  fancy  to  land  in  Spain,  and  trying  what 
he  could  make  of  his  rights  as  far  round  Gibraltar  as  he 
could  enforce  them.  At  all  events,  Master  Joachim  has  some- 
how got  hold  of  Prussia  ;  and  means  to  keep  it. 

IX.  Johann  Sigismund.  Only  notable  for  our  economical 
purposes,  as  getting  the  "  guardianship  "  of  Prussia  confirmed 
to  him.  The  story  at  page  317  (226),  "  a  strong  flame  of 
cboler,"  indicates  a  new  order  of  things  among  the  knights  of 
Europe — "princely  etiquettes  melting  all  into  smoke."  Too 


452 


THE  CROWN  OF  WILD  OLIVE. 


literally  so,  that  being  one  of  the  calamitous  functions  of  the 
plain  lives  we  are  living,  and  of  the  busy  life  our  country  is 
living.  In  the  Duchy  of  Cleve,  especially,  concerning  which 
legal  dispute  begins  in  Sigismund's  time.  And  it  is  well 
worth  the  lawyers'  trouble,  it  seems. 

It  amounted,  perhaps,  to  two  Yorkshires  in  extent.  A  nat- 
urally opulent  country  of  fertile  meadows,  shipping  capabili- 
ties, metalliferous  hills,  and  at  this  time,  in  consequence  of 
the  Dutch-Spanish  war,  and  the  multitude  of  Protestant  ref- 
ugees, it  was  getting  filled  with  ingenious  industries,  and 
rising  to  be  what  it  still  is,  the  busiest  quarter  of  Germany. 
A  country  lowing  with  kine  ;  the  hum  of  the  flax-spindle 
heard  in  its  cottages  in  those  old  days — "  much  of  the  linen 
called  Hollands  is  made  in  Jiilich,  and  only  bleached, 
stamped,  and  sold  by  the  Dutch,"  says  Biisching.  A  country 
in  our  days  which  is  shrouded  at  short  intervals  with  the  due 
canopy  of  coal-smoke,  and  loud  with  sounds  of  the  anvil  and 
the  loom. 

The  lawyers  took  two  hundred  and  six  years  to  settle  the 
question  concerning  this  Duchy,  and  the  thing  Johann  Sigis- 
mund  had  claimed  legally  in  1609  was  actually  handed  over 
to  Johann  Sigismund's  descendant  in  the  seventh  generation. 
"  These  litigated  duchies  are  now  the  Prussian  provinces, 
Jiilich,  Berg,  Cleve,  and  the  nucleus  of  Prussia's  possessions 
in  the  Rhine  country." 

X.  George  Wilhelm.  Bead  pp.  325  to  327  (231,  233)  on 
this  Elector  and  German  Protestantism,  now  fallen  cold,  and 
somewhat  too  little  dangerous.  But  George  Wilhelm  is  the 
only  weak  prince  of  all  the  twelve.  For  another  example 
how  the  heart  and  life  of  a  country  depend  upon  its  prince, 
not  on  its  council,  read  this,  of  Gustavus  Adolphus,  demand- 
ing the  cession  of  Spandau  and  Kilstrin  : 

Which  cession  Kurfiirst  George  Wilhelm,  though  giving 
all  his  prayers  to  the  good  cause,  could  by  no  means  grant. 
Gustav  had  to  insist,  with  more  and  more  emphasis,  advanc- 
ing at  last  with  military  menace  upon  Berlin  itself.    He  was 


POLITICAL  ECONOMY  OF  PRUSSIA.  453 


met  by  George  Wilhelm  and  his  Council,  V  in  the  woods  of 
Copenick,"  short  way  to  the  east  of  that  city ;  there  George 
Wilhelm  and  his  Council  wandered  about,  sending  messages, 
hopelessly  consulting,  saying  among  each  other,  "  Que  faire  ? 
ils  ont  des  canons."  For  many  hours  so,  round  the  inflexible 
Gustav,  who  was  there  like  a  fixed  mile-stone,  and  to  all 
questions  and  comers  had  only  one  answer. 

On  our  special  question  of  war  and  its  consequences,  read 
this  of  the  Thirty  Years'  one : 

But  on  the  whole,  the  grand  weapon  in  it,  and  towards  the 
latter  times,  the  exclusive  one,  was  hunger.  The  opposing 
armies  tried  to  starve  one  another ;  at  lowest,  tried  each  not 
to  starve.  Each  trying  to  eat  the  country  or,  at  any  rate,  to 
leave  nothing  eatable  in  it ;  what  that  will  mean  for  the 
country  we  may  consider.  As  the  armies  too  frequently,  and 
the  Kaiser's  armies  habitually,  lived  without  commissariat, 
often  enough  without  pay,  all  horrors  of  war  and  of  being  a 
seat  of  war,  that  have  been  since  heard  of,  are  poor  to  those 
then  practised,  the  detail  of  which  is  still  horrible  to  read. 
Germany,  in  all  eatable  quarters  of  it,  had  to  undergo  the 
process ;  tortured,  torn  to  pieces,  wrecked,  and  brayed  as  in 
a  mortar,  under  the  iron  mace  of  war.  Brandenburg  saw  its 
towns  seized  and  sacked,  its  country  populations  driven  to 
despair  by  the  one  party  and  the  other.  Three  times — first 
in  the  Wallenstein-Mecklenburg  times,  while  fire  and  sword 
were  the  weapons,  and  again,  twice  over,  in  the  ultimate 
stages  of  the  struggle,  when  starvation  had  become  the 
method — Brandenburg  fell  to  be  the  principal  theatre  of  con- 
flict, where  all  forms  of  the  dismal  were  at  their  height.  In 
1638,  three  years  after  that  precious  "  Peace  of  Prag," 
.  .  .  the  ravages  of  the  starving  Gallas  and  his  Imperial- 
ists excelled  all  precedent,  .  .  .  men  ate  human  flesh, 
nay,  human  creatures  ate  their  own  children.  "  Que  faire  ? 
ils  ont  des  canons  !  1 

"  We  have  now  arrived  at  the  lowest  nadir  point "  (says 
Carlyle)  "  of  the  history  of  Brandenburg  under  the  Hohen- 
zollerns.,,  Is  this  then  all  that  Heavy  Peg  and  our  nine 
Kurf firsts  have  done  for  us  ? 


454 


THE  CROWN  OF  WILD  OLIVE. 


Carlyle  does  not  mean  that  ;  but  even  he,  greatest  of  his- 
torians since  Tacitus,  is  not  enough  careful  to  mark  for  us 
the  growth  of  national  character,  as  distinct  from  the  pros- 
perity of  dynasties. 

A  republican  historian  would  think  of  this  develop- 
ment only,  and  suppose  it  to  be  possible  without  any  dy- 
nasties. 

Which  is  indeed  in  a  measure  so,  and  the  work  now  chiefly 
needed  in  moral  philosophy,  as  well  as  history,  is  an  analysis 
of  the  constant  and  prevalent,  yet  unthought  of,  influences, 
which,  without  any  external  help  from  kings,  and  in  a  silent 
and  entirely  necessary  manner,  form,  in  Sweden,  in  Bava- 
ria, in  the  Tyrol,  in  the  Scottish  border,  and  on  the  French 
sea-coast,  races  of  noble  peasants  ;  pacific,  poetic,  heroic, 
Christian-hearted  in  the  deepest  sense,  who  may  indeed 
perish  by  sword  or  famine  in  any  cruel  thirty  years'  war,  or 
ignoble  thirty  years*  peace,  and  yet  leave  such  strength  to 
their  children  that  the  country,  apparently  ravaged  into  hope- 
less ruin,  revives,  under  any  prudent  king,  as  the  cultivated 
fields  do  under  the  spring  rain.  How  the  rock  to  which  no 
seed  can  cling,  and  which  no  rain  can  soften,  is  subdued  into 
the  good  ground  which  can  bring  forth  its  hundredfold,  we 
forget  to  watch,  while  we  follow  the  footsteps  of  the  sower, 
or  mourn  the  catastrophes  of  storm.  All  this  while,  the 
Prussian  earth — the  Prussian  soul — has  been  thus  dealt 
upon  by  successive  fate  ;  and  now,  though  laid,  as  it  seems, 
utterly  desolate,  it  can  be  revived  by  a  few  years  of  wisdom 
and  of  peace. 

Vol.  L  Book  III.  Chap,  xviii.— The  Great  Elector,  Fried- 
rich  Wilhelm.    Eleventh  of  the  dynasty  : — 

There  hardly  ever  came  to  sovereign  power  a  young  man 
of  twenty  under  more  distressing,  hopeless-looking  circum- 
stances. Political  significance  Brandenburg  had  none  ;  a 
mere  Protestant  appendage,  dragged  about  by  a  Papist  Kai- 
ser. His  father's  Prime  Minister,  as  we  have  seen,  was  in  the 
interest  of  his  enemies ;  not  Brandenburg's  servant,  but 
Austria's.  The  very  commandants  of  his  fortresses,  Com- 
mandant of  Spandau  more  especially,  refused  to  obey  Fried- 


POLITICAL  ECONOMY  OF  PRUSSIA.  455 


rich  Wilhelm  on  his  accession  ;  "  were  bound  to  obey  the 
Kaiser  in  the  first  place." 

For  twenty  years  past  Brandenburg  had  been  scoured  by 
hostile  armies,  which,  especially  the  Kaiser's  part  of  which, 
committed  outrages  new  in  human  history.  In  a  }^ear  or  two 
hence,  Brandenburg  became  again  the  theatre  of  business, 
Austrian  Gallas  advancing  thither  again  (1644)  with  intent 
"  to  shut  up  Torstenson  and  his  Swedes  in  Jutland."  Gallas 
could  by  no  means  do  what  he  intended ;  on  the  contrary, 
he  had  to  run  from  Torstenson — what  feet  could  do  ;  was 
hunted,  he  and  his  Merode  Briider  (beautiful  inventors  of 
the  "marauding"  art),  till  they  pretty  much  all  died  (ere- 
pirten)  says  Kohler.  No  great  loss  to  society,  the  death  of 
these  artists,  but  we  can  fancy  what  their  life,  and  especially 
what  the  process  of  their  dying,  may  have  cost  poor  Branden- 
burg again ! 

Priedrich  Wilhelm's  aim,  in  this  as  in  other  emergencies, 
was  sun-clear  to  himself,  but  for  most  part  dim  to  everybody 
else.  He  had  to  walk  very  warily,  Sweden  on  one  hand  of  him, 
suspicious  Kaiser  on  the  other :  he  had  to  wear  semblances, 
to  be  ready  with  evasive  words,  and  advance  noiselessly  by 
many  circuits.  More  delicate  operation  could  not  be  imag- 
ined. But  advance  he  did ;  advance  and  arrive.  With  ex- 
traordinary talent,  diligence,  and  felicity  the  young  man 
wound  himself  out  of  this  first  fatal  position,  got  those  foreign 
armies  pushed  out  of  his  country,  and  kept  them  out.  His 
first  concern  had  been  to  find  some  vestige  of  revenue,  to  put 
that  upon  a  clear  footing,  and  by  loans  or  otherwise  to  scrape 
a  little  ready-money  together.  On  the  strength  of  ivhich  a 
small  body  of  soldiers  could  be  collected  about  him,  and  drilled 
into  real  ability  to  fight  and  obey.  This  as  a  basis :  on  this 
followed  all  manner  of  things,  freedom  from  Swedish- Austrian 
invasions,  as  the  first  thing.  He  was  himself,  as  appeared 
by-and-by,  a  fighter  of  the  first  quality,  when  it  came  to  that ; 
but  never  was  willing  to  fight  if  he  could  help  it.  Preferred 
rather  to  shift,  manoeuvre,  and  negotiate,  which  he  did  in 
most  vigilant,  adroit,  and  masterly  manner.  But  by  degrees 
he  had  grown  to  have,  and  could  maintain  it,  an  army  of 
twenty-four  thousand  men,  among  the  best  troops  then  in 
being. 

To  wear  semblances,  to  be  ready  with  evasive  words,  how  is 
this,  Mr.  Carlyle  ?  thinks  perhaps  the  rightly  thoughtful  reader. 


456 


THE  CROWN  OF  WILD  OLIVE. 


Yes,  such  things  have  to  be.  There  are  lies  and  lies,  and 
there  are  truths  and  truths.  Ulysses  cannot  ride  on  the 
ram's  back,  like  Phryxus ;  but  must  ride  under  his  belly. 
Eead  also  this,  presently  following  : 

Shortly  after  which,  Friedrich  Wilhelm,  who  had  shone 
much  in  the  battle  of  Warsaw,  into  which  he  was  dragged 
against  his  will,  changed  sides.  An  inconsistent,  treacherous 
man?  Perhaps  not,  O  reader  !  perhaps  a  man  advancing  "in 
circuits,"  the  only  way  he  has  ;  spirally,  face  now  to  east,  now 
to  west,  with  his  own  reasonable  private  aim  sun-clear  to 
him  all  the  while  ? 

The  battle  of  Warsaw,  three  days  long,  fought  with  Gus- 
tavus,  the  grandfather  of  Charles  XII.,  against  the  Poles,  vir- 
tually ends  the  Polish  power : 

Old  Johann  Casimir,  not  long  after  that  peace  of  Oliva, 
getting  tired  of  his  unruly  Polish  chivalry  and  their  ways, 
abdicated — retired  to  Paris,  and  "and  lived  much  with  Ninon 
de  l'Enclos  and  her  circle/'  for  the  rest  of  his  life.  He  used 
to  complain  of  his  Polish  chivalry,  that  there  was  no  solidity 
in  them  ;  nothing  but  outside  glitter,  with  tumult  and  anar- 
chic noise  ;  fatal  want  of  one  essential  talent,  the  talent  of 
obeying ;  and  has  been  heard  to  prophesy  that  a  glorious 
Bepublic,  persisting  in  such  courses,  would  arrive  at  results 
which  would  surprise  it. 

Onward  from  this  time,  Friedrich  Wilhelm  figures  in  the 
world  ;  public  men  watching  his  procedure  ;  kings  anxious 
to  secure  him — Dutch  print-sellers  sticking  up  his  portraits 
for  a  hero-worshipping  public.  Fighting  hero,  had  the  pub- 
lic known  it,  was  not  his  essential  character,  though  he  had 
to  fight  a  great  deal.  He  was  essentially  an  industrial  man  ; 
great  in  organizing,  regulating,  in  constraining  chaotic  heaps 
to  become  cosmic  for  him.  He  drains  bogs,  settles  colonies 
in  the  waste  places  of  his  dominions,  cuts  canals ;  unwea- 
riedly  encourages  trade  and  work.  The  Friedrich  Wilhelm's 
Canal,  which  still  carries  tonnage  from  the  Oder  to  the  Spree, 
is  a  monument  of  his  zeal  in  this  way  ;  creditable  with  the 
means  he  had.  To  the  poor  French  Protestants  in  the  Edict- 
of-Nantes  affair,  he  was  like  an  express  benefit  of  Heaven  ; 
one  helper  appointed  to  whom  the  help  itself  was  profit- 


POLITICAL  ECONOMY  OF  PRUSSIA.  457 


able.  He  munificently  welcomed  them  to  Brandenburg ; 
showed  really  a  noble  piety  and  human  pity,  as  well  as  judg- 
ment ;  nor  did  Brandenburg  and  he  want  their  reward.  Some 
twenty  thousand  nimble  French  souls,  evidently  of  the  best 
French  quality,  found  a  home  there  ;  made  "  waste  sands 
about  Berlin  into  potherb  gardens ; "  and  in  spiritual  Bran- 
denburg, too,  did  something  of  horticulture  which  is  still 
noticeable. 

Now  read  carefully  the  description  of  the  man,  p.  352 
(224-5);  the  story  of  the  battle  of  Fehrbellin,  "the  Mara- 
thon of  Brandenburg/'  p.  354  (225) ;  and  of  the  winter  cam- 
paign of  1679,  p.  356  (227),  beginning  with  its  week's 
marches  at  sixty  miles  a  day  ;  his  wife,  as  always,  being  with 
him  : 

Louisa,  honest  and  loving  Dutch  girl,  aunt  to  our  William 
of  Orange,  who  trimmed  up  her  own  "  Orange-burg  "  (coun- 
try-house), twenty  miles  north  of  Berlin,  into  a  little  jewel  of 
the  Dutch  type,  potherb  gardens,  training-schools  for  young 
girls,  and  the  like,  a  favorite  abode  of  hers  when  she  was  at 
liberty  for  recreation.  But  her  life  was  busy  and  earnest ; 
she  was  helpmate,  not  in  name  only,  to  an  ever  busy  man. 
They  were  married  young  ;  a  marriage  of  love  withal.  Young 
Friedrich  Wilbelm's  courtship ;  wedding  in  Holland ;  the 
honest,  trustful  walk  and  conversation  of  the  two  sovereign 
spouses,  their  journeyings  together,  their  mutual  hopes,  fears, 
and  manifold  vicissitudes,  till  death,  with  stern  beauty,  shut 
it  in  ;  all  is  human,  true,  and  wholesome  in  it,  interesting  to 
look  upon,  and  rare  among  sovereign  persons. 

Louisa  died  in  1667,  twenty-one  years  before  her  husband, 
who  married  again — (little  to  his  contentment) — died  in  1688  ; 
and  Louisa's  second  son,  Friedrich,  ten  years  old  at  his 
mother's  death,  and  now  therefore  thirty-one,  succeeds,  be- 
coming afterwards  Friedrich  I.  of  Prussia. 

And  here  we  pause  on  two  great  questions.  Prussia  is 
assuredly  at  this  point  a  happier  and  better  country  than  it 
was,  when  inhabited  by  Wends.  But  is  Friedrich  I.  a  hap- 
pier and  better  man  than  Henry  the  Fowler  ?  Have  all  these 
kings  thus  improved  their  country,  but  never  themselves? 


458 


THE  CROWN  OF  WILD  OLIVE. 


Is  this  somewhat  expensive  and  ambitious  Herr,  Friedrich  I. 
buttoned  in  diamonds,  indeed  the  best  that  Protestantism 
can  produce,  as  against  Fowlers,  Bears,  and  Red  Beards? 
Much  more,  Friedrich  Wilhelm,  orthodox  on  predestination  ; 
most  of  all,  his  less  orthodox  son  ; — have  we,  in  these,  the 
highest  results  which  Dr.  Martin  Luther  can  produce  for  the 
present,  in  the  first  circles  of  society  ?  And  if  not,  how  is  it 
that  the  country,  having  gained  so  much  in  intelligence  and 
strength,  lies  more  passively  in  their  power  than  the  baser 
country  did  under  that  of  nobler  men  ? 

These,  and  collateral  questions,  I  mean  to  work  out  as  I 
can,  with  Carlyle's  good  help ; — but  must  pause  for  this  time ; 
in  doubt,  as  heretofore.  Only  of  this  one  thing  I  doubt  not, 
that  the  name  of  all  great  kings,  set  over  Christian  nations, 
must  at  last  be,  in  fufilment,  the  hereditary  one  of  these 
German  princes,  "  Rich  in  Peace  ; "  and  that  their  coronation 
will  be  with  Wild  olive,  not  with  gold. 


THE 

ETHICS  OF  THE  DUST 

TEN  LECTURES 

TO 

LITTLE  HOUSEWIVES 

ON 

THE  ELEMENTS  OF  CRYSTALLISATION 


CONTENTS. 


ETHICS  OF  THE  DUST. 

LECTURE  I. 
The  Valley  of  Diamonds 

LECTURE  II. 
The  Pyramid  Builders  .... 

LECTURE  III. 

The  Crystal  Life  . 

LECTURE  IV. 
The  Crystal  Orders        .         .         .  • 

LECTURE  V. 
Crystal  Virtues  .... 

LECTURE  VI. 
Crystal  Quarrels  • 

LECTURE  VII. 
Home  Virtues  . 


LECTURE  VIII. 
Crystal  Caprice  ..... 

LECTURE  IX. 
Crystal  Sorrows  .... 

LECTURE  X. 
The  Crystal  Rest  ..... 

Notes       •         •        •         •         •  • 

Fiction— Fair  and  Foul 

ELEMENTS  OF  DRAWING. 

LETTER  I. 

On  First  Practice  •        .  , 

LETTER  II. 

Sketching  from  Nature 

LETTER  III, 
On  Colour  and  Composition 

Appendix:  Things  to  be  Studied 


LIST  OF  ILLUSTRATIONS. 


ELEMENTS  OF  DRAWING. 


FIGURE  PAGB 

1.  Squares        .        .         .         .        .        •        „  237 

2.  Gradated  Spaces        ......  241 

3.  Outline  of  Letter  ,  245 

4.  Outline  of  Bough  of  Tree  .....  248 

5.  Charred  Log        ......  257 

6.  Shoot  of  Lilac  ......  272 

7.  Leaf    ........  274 

8.  Bough  of  Phillyrea  ......  275 

9.  Spray  of  Phillyrea  .....  276 

10.  Trunk  of  Tree,  by  Titian  .....  284 

11.  Sketch  from  Raphael       ,  285 

12.  Outlines  of  a  Ball     .  .  .        .        .         ;  287 

13.  Woodcut  of  Durer's  .  289 

14.  15,  16.  Masses  of  Leaves  ....  290,  291 
17,  18,  19.   Curvatures  in  Leaves      .        .        .  295,  296 

20.  From  an  Etching,  by  Turner  .         .         .         .  .297 

21.  Alpine  Bridge        ......  307 

22.  Alpine  Bridge  as  it  Appears  at  Various  Distances      .  308 


FIGURE  PAGE 

23.  Outlines  Expressive  of  Foliage  .         .         .  314 

24.  Shoot  of  Spanish  Chestnut  .  .  .  315 
25  Young  Shoot  of  Oak  .  316 
26,  27,  28.    Woodcuts  after  Titian  .         .         .321,  322 

29.  Diagram  of  Window  ...»  339 

30.  Swiss  Cottage   .......  355 

31.  Groups  of  Leaves    ......  359 

32.  Painting,  by  Turner      ......  361 

33.  Sketch  on  Calais  Sands,  by  Turner       .  .  365 

34.  Drawing  of  an  Ileal  Bridge,  by  Turner    .  .         .  369 

35.  Profile  of  the  Towers  of  Ehrenbreitstein  .  .  370 

36.  Curves     .  .         .         .        .         .         .  37 1 

37.  38,  39.  Curves  Found  in  Leaves  ....  372 
40.  Outlines  of  a  Tree  Trunk  .  373 
41-44.  Tree  Radiation  .  374,  375 
45,  46.    Woodcuts  of  Leaf           .....  376 

47.  Leaf  of  Columbine  •  378 

48.  Top  of  an  Old  Tower  .        •        .        .        .        .  385 


PERSONAL 


Old  Lecturer  (o£  incalculable  age) 

Florrie,  on  astronomical  evidence  presumed  to  be  aged  9# 


Luc  ill  A  .   "15. 

Violet      .      .      .                                         .  "  16. 

Dora  (who  has  the  keys  and  is  housekeeper)     .       .  u  17. 

Egypt  (so  called  from  her  dark  eyes)  .       .       .  14  17. 

Jessie  (who  somehow  always  makes  the  room  look 

brighter  when  she  is  in  it)    .       .       .       .       .  "  18. 

Mary  (ol  whom  everybody,  including  the  Old  Lec- 
turer, is  in  great  awe)  .       .      *      #       ,       .  41  20. 


Isabel 
May  . 
Lily  . 
Kathleen 


"  11, 

44  It 

11  12. 

44  14. 


PREFACE  TO  THE  SECOND  EDITION, 


t  have  seldom  been  more  disappointed  by  the  result  of  my 
best  pains  given  to  any  of  my  books,  than  by  the  earnest 
request  of  my  publisher,  after  the  opinion  of  the  public  had 
been  taken  on  the  '  Ethics  of  the  Dast,'  that  I  would  "  write 
no  more  in  dialogue  ! "  However,  I  bowed  to  public  judg- 
ment in  this  matter  at  once,  (kaowing  also  my  inventive 
powers  to  be  of  the  feeblest,)  ;  but  in  reprinting  the  book, 
(at  the  prevailing  request  of  my  kind  friend,  Mr.  Henry  Wil- 
lett,)  I  would  pray  the  readers  whom  it  may  at  first  offend  by 
its  disconnected  method,  to  examine,  nevertheless,  with  care, 
the  passages  in  which  the  principal  speaker  sums  the  conclu- 
sions of  any  dialogue  :  for  these  summaries  were  written  as 
introductions,  for  young  people,  to  all  that  I  have  said  on  the 
same  matters  in  my  larger  books  ;  and,  on  re-reading  them, 
they  satisfy  me  better,  and  seem  to  me  calculated  to  be  more 
generally  useful,  than  anything  else  I  have  done  of  the  kind. 

The  summary  of  the  contents  of  the  whole  book,  beginning, 
4 'You  may  at  least  earnest]y  believe,"  at  p.  130,  is  thus  the 
clearest  exposition  I  have  ever  yet  given  of  the  general  con- 
ditions under  which  the  Personal  Creative  Power  manifests 
itself  in  the  forms  of  matter  ;  and  the  analysis  of  heathen  con- 
ceptions of  Deity,  beginning  at  p.  131,  and  closing  at  p.  138, 
not  only  prefaces,  but  very  nearly  supersedes,  all  that  in  more 
lengthy  terms  I  have  since  asserted,  or  pleaded  for,  in  '  Ara* 
tra  Pentelici,'  and  the  '  Queen  of  the  Air.' 


6 


PREFACE  TO  THE  SECOND  EDITION. 


And  thus,  however  the  book  may  fail  in  its  intention  of 
suggesting  new  occupations  or  interests  to  its  younger  read- 
ers, I  think  it  worth  reprinting,  in  the  way  I  have  also  re- 
printed '  Unto  this  Last/ — page  for  page  ;  that  the  students 
of  my  more  advanced  works  may  be  able  to  refer  to  these  as 
the  original  documents  of  them  ;  of  which  the  most  essential 
in  this  book  are  these  following. 

I.  The  explanation  of  the  baseness  of  the  avaricious  func- 
tions of  the  Lower  Pthah,  p.  39,  with  his  beetle-gospel,  p.  41, 
"  that  a  nation  can  stand  on  its  vices  better  than  on  its  vir- 
tues/' explains  the  main  motive  of  all  my  books  on  Political 
Economy. 

II.  The  examination  of  the  connexion  between  stupidity 
and  crime,  pp.  57-62,  anticipated  all  that  I  have  had  to  urge 
in  Fors  Clavigera  against  the  commonly  alleged  excuse  for 
public  wickedness, — "  They  don't  mean  it — they  don't  know 
any  better." 

III.  The  examination  of  the  roots  of  Moral  Power,  pp. 
90-92,  is  a  summary  of  what  is  afterwards  developed  with 
utmost  care  in  my  inaugural  lecture  at  Oxford  on  the  rela- 
tion of  Art  to  Morals  ;  compare  in  that  lecture,  §§  83-85,  with 
the  sentence  in  p.  91  of  this  book,  "  Nothing  is  ever  done  so 
as  really  to  please  our  Father,  unless  we  would  also  have  done 
it,  though  we  had  had  no  Father  to  know  of  it." 

This  sentence,  however,  it  must  be  observed,  regards  only 
the  general  conditions  of  action  in  the  children  of  God,  in 
consequence  of  which  it  is  foretold  of  them  by  Christ  that 
they  will  say  at  the  Judgment,  "  When  saw  we  thee  ?  "  It 
does  not  refer  to  the  distinct  cases  in  which  virtue  consists  in 
faith  given  to  command,  appearing  to  foolish  human  judg- 
ment inconsistent  with  the  Moral  Law,  as  in  the  sacrifice  of 
Isaac  ;  nor  to  those  in  which  any  directly -given  command  re- 
quires nothing  more  of  virtue  than  obedience. 


PREFACE  TO  THE  SECOND  EDITION. 


7 


IV.  The  subsequent  pages,  92-97,  were  written  especially 
to  check  the  dangerous  impulses  natural  to  the  minds  of  many 
amiable  young  women,  in  the  direction  of  narrow  and  selfish 
religious  sentiment :  and  they  contain,  therefore,  nearly 
everything  which  I  believe  it  necessary  that  young  people 
should  be  made  to  observe,  respecting  the  errors  of  monastic 
life.  But  they  in  nowise  enter  on  the  reverse,  or  favourable 
side  :  of  which  indeed  I  did  not,  and  as  yet  do  not,  feel  my- 
self able  to  speak  with  any  decisiveness ;  the  evidence  on  that 
side,  as  stated  in  the  text,  having  "  never  yet  been  dispassion- 
ately examined." 

V.  The  dialogue  wTith  Lucilla,  beginning  at  p.  63,  is,  to 
my  own  fancy,  the  best  bit  of  conversation  in  the  book,  and 
the  issue  of  it.  at  p.  67,  the  most  practically  and  immedi- 
ately useful.  For  on  the  idea  of  the  inevitable  weakness  and 
corruption  of  human  nature,  has  logically  followed,  in  our 
daily  life,  the  horrible  creed  of  modern  "  Social  science,"  that 
all  social  action  must  be  scientifically  founded  on  vicious  im- 
pulses. But  on  the  habit  of  measuring  and  reverencing  our 
powers  and  talents  that  we  may  kindly  use  them,  will  be 
founded  a  true  Social  science,  developing,  by  the  employ- 
ment of  them,  all  the  real  powers  and  honourable  feelings  of 
the  race. 

VI.  Finally,  the  account  given  in  the  second  and  third  lect- 
ures, of  the  real  nature  and  marvellousness  of  the  laws  of 
crystallization,  is  necessary  to  the  understanding  of  what 
farther  teaching  of  the  beauty  of  inorganic  form  I  may  bo 
able  to  give,  either  in  '  Deucalion,'  or  in  my  '  Elements  of 
Drawing.'  I  wish  however  that  the  second  lecture  had  been 
made  the  beginning  of  the  book  ;  and  would  fain  now  cancel 
the  first  altogether,  which  I  perceive  to  be  both  obscure  and 
dull.  It  was  meant  for  a  metaphorical  description  of  the 
pleasures  and  dangers  in  the  kingdom  of  Mammon,  or  of 


s 


PREFACE  TO  TEE  SECOND  EDITION. 


worldly  wealth  ;  its  waters  mixed  with  blood,  its  fruits  en- 
tangled in  thickets  of  trouble,  and  poisonous  when  gathered  ; 
and  the  final  captivity  of  its  inhabitants  within  frozen  walls  of 
cruelty  and  disdain.  But  the  imagery  is  stupid  and  ineffec- 
tive throughout  ;  and  I  retain  this  chapter  only  because  I  am 
resolved  to  leave  no  room  for  any  one  to  say  that  I  have  with- 
drawn, as  erroneous  in  principle,  so  much  as  a  single  sentence 
of  any  of  my  books  written  since  1860. 

One  license  taken  in  this  book,  however,  though  often  per- 
mitted to  essay- writers  for  the  relief  of  their  dulness,  I  never 
mean  to  take  more, — the  relation  of  composed  metaphor  as  of 
actual  dream,  pp.  23  and  104.  I  assumed,  it  is  true,  that  in 
these  places  the  supposed  dream  would  be  easily  seen  to  be 
an  invention  ;  but  must  not  any  more,  even  under  so  trans- 
parent disguise,  pretend  to  any  share  in  the  real  powers  of 
Vision  possessed  by  great  poets  and  true  painters. 

Brantwood  : 

10th  October,  1877. 


PREFACE. 


The  following  lectures  were  really  given,  in  substance,  at  a 
girls'  school  (far  in  the  country)  ;  which  in  the  course  of  vari- 
ous experiments  on  the  possibility  of  introducing  some  better 
practice  of  drawing  into  the  modern  scheme  of  female  educa- 
tion, I  visited  frequently  enough  to  enable  the  children  to  re- 
gard me  as  a  friend.  The  lectures  always  fell  more  or  less 
into  the  form  of  fragmentary  answers  to  questions  ;  and  they 
are  allowed  to  retain  that  form,  as,  on  the  whole,  likely  to  be 
more  interesting  than  the  symmetries  of  a  continuous  treatise. 
Many  children  (for  the  school  was  large)  took  part,  at  different 
times,  in  the  conversations  ;  but  I  have  endeavoured,  without 
confusedly  multiplying  the  number  of  imaginary  *  speakers, 
to  represent,  as  far  as  I  could,  the  general  tone  of  comment 
and  enquiry  among  young  people. 

It  will  be  at  once  seen  that  these  Lectures  were  not  intended 
for  an  introduction  to  mineralogy.  Their  purpose  was  merely 
to  awaken  in  the  minds  of  young  girls,  who  were  ready  to  work 
earnestly  and  systematically,  a  vital  interest  in  the  subject  of 
their  study.  No  science  can  be  learned  in  play  ;  but  it  is  often 
possible,  in  play,  to  bring  good  fruit  out  of  past  labour,  or 
show  sufficient  reasons  for  the  labour  of  the  future. 

*  I  do  not  mean,  in  saying  *  imaginary,'  that  I  have  not  permitted  to 
myself,  in  several  instances,  the  affectionate  discourtesy  of  some  remi- 
niscence of  personal  character  ;  for  which  I  must  hope  to  be  forgiven  by 
my  old  pupils  and  their  friends,  as  I  could  not  otherwise  have  written 
the  book  at  all.  But  only  two  sentences  in  all  the  dialogues,  and  the 
anecdote  of  *  Dotty,'  are  literally  'historical.' 


10 


PREFACE. 


The  narrowness  of  this  aim  does  not,  indeed,  justify  the  ab* 
sence  of  all  reference  to  many  important  principles  of  struct* 
ure,  and  many  of  the  most  interesting*  orders  of  minerals  ;  but 
I  felt  it  impossible  to  go  far  into  detail  without  illustrations  ; 
and  if  readers  find  this  book  useful,  I  may,  perhaps,  endeavour 
to  supplement  it  by  illustrated  notes  of  the  more  interesting 
phenomena  in  separate  groups  of  familiar  minerals  ; — flints  of 
the  chalk  ; — agates  of  the  basalts  ; — and  the  fantastic  and  ex- 
quisitely beautiful  varieties  of  the  vein-ores  of  the  two  com- 
monest metals,  lead  and  iron.  But  I  have  always  found  that 
the  less  we  speak  of  our  intentions,  the  more  chance  there  is 
of  our  realizing  them  ;  and  this  poor  little  book  will  suffi- 
ciently have  done  its  work,  for  the  present,  if  it  engages  any 
of  its  young  readers  in  study  which  may  enable  them  to  de« 
spise  it  for  its  shortcomings. 

Denmakk  Hill  : 

Ckmtmm,  186-5. 


THE  ETHICS  OF  THE  DUST. 


LECTURE  I. 

THE  VALLEY  OF  DIAMONDS. 
A  very  idle  talk,  by  the  dining-room  fire,  after  raisin -and-almond  time. 

Old  Lecturer  ;  Florrie,  Isabel,  May,  Lily,  and  Sibyl. 

Old  Lecturer  (L.).  Come  here,  Isabel,  and  tell  me  what 
the  make-believe  was,  this  afternoon. 

Isabel  (arranging  herself  very  primly  on  the  j bot-stool).  Such 
a  dreadful  one !  Florrie  and  I  were  lost  in  the  Yalley  of 
Diamonds. 

L.  What !  Sindbads,  which  nobody  could  get  out  of  ? 
Isabel.  Yes  ;  but  Florrie  and  I  got  out  of  it. 
L.  So  I  see.    At  least,  I  see  you  did ;  but  are  you  sure 
Florrie  did  ? 

Isabel.  Quite  sure. 

Florrie  (putting  her  head  round  from  behind  L.'s  sofa* 
cushion).  Quite  sure.    (Disappears  again.) 

L.  I  think  I  could  be  made  to  feel  surer  about  it, 

(Florrie  reappears,  gives  L.  a  kiss,  and  again  exit.) 

L.  I  suppose  it's  all  right ;  but  how  did  you  manage  it  ? 

Isabel.  Well,  you  know,  the  eagle  that  took  up  Sindbad  was 
very  large — very,  very  large — the  largest  of  all  the  eagles. 

L.  How  large  were  the  others  ? 

Isabel.  I  don't  quite  know — they  were  so  far  off.  But  this 
one  was,  oh,  so  big !  and  it  had  great  wings,  as  wide  as — 
twice  over  the  ceiling.  So,  when  it  was  picking  up  Sindbad, 
Florrie  and  I  thought  it  wouldn't  know  if  we  got  on  its  back 
too :  so  I  got  up  first,  and  then  I  pulled  up  Florrie,  and  we 
put  our  arms  round  its  neck,  and  away  it  new. 


12 


THE  ETHICS  OF  THE  DUST. 


L.  But  why  did  you  want  to  get  out  of  the  valley  ?  and 
why  haven't  you  brought  me  some  diamonds  ? 

Isabel.  It  was  because  of  the  serpents.  I  couldn't  pick  up 
even  the  least  little  bit  of  a  diamond,  I  was  so  frightened. 

L.  You  should  not  have  minded  the  serpents. 

Isabel.  Oh,  but  suppose  that  they  had  minded  me  ? 

L.  We  all  of  us  mind  you  a  little  too  much,  Isabel,  Tm 
afraid. 

Isabel.  No — no — no,  indeed. 

L.  I  tell  you  what,  Isabel — I  don't  believe  either  Sindbad, 
or  Florrie,  or  you,  ever  were  in  the  Valley  of  Diamonds. 
Isabel.  You  naughty  !  when  I  tell  you  we  were  ! 
L.  Because  you  say  you  were  frightened  at  the  serpents. 
Isabel.  And  wouldn't  you  have  been  ? 

L.  Not  at  those  serpents.  Nobody  who  really  goes  into 
the  valley  is  ever  frightened  at  them — they  are  so  beautiful. 

Isabel  (suddenly  serious).  But  there's  no  real  Valley  of  Dia- 
monds, is  there  ? 

L.  Yes,  Isabel ;  very  real  indeed. 

Florrie  (reappearing).  Oh,  where  ?    Tell  me  about  it. 

L.  I  cannot  tell  you  a  great  deal  about  it ;  only  I  know  it 
is  very  different  from  Sindbad's.  In  his  valley,  there  was 
only  a  diamond  lying  here  and  there  ;  but,  in  the  real  valley, 
there  are  diamonds  covering  the  grass  in  showers  every  morn- 
ing, instead  of  dew  :  and  there  are  clusters  of  trees,  which 
look  like  lilac  trees ;  but,  in  spring,  all  their  blossoms  are  of 
amethyst, 

Florrie.  But  there  can't  be  any  serpents  there,  then  ? 
L.  Why  not? 

Florrie.  Because  they  don't  come  into  such  beautiful 
places. 

L.  I  never  said  it  wTas  a  beautiful  place. 
Florrie.  What !  not  with  diamonds  strewed  about  it  like 
dew  ? 

L.  That's  according  to  your  fancy,  Florrie.  For  myself,  X 
like  dew  better. 

Ibabel.  Oh,  but  the  dew  won't  stay  ;  it  all  dries ! 

L.  Yes ;  and  it  would  be  much  nicer  if  the  diamonds  dried 


THE  VALLEY  OF  DIAMONDS. 


13 


too,  for  the  people  in  the  valley  have  to  sweep  them  off  the 
grass,  in  heaps,  whenever  they  want  to  walk  on  it ;  and  then 
the  heaps  glitter  so,  they  hurt  one's  eyes. 

Floerie.  Now  you're  just  playing,  you  know. 

L.  So  are  you,  you  know. 

Florrie.  Yes,  but  you  mustn't  play. 

L.  That's  very  hard,  Florrie  ;  why  mustn't  I,  if  you  may  ? 

Florrie.  Oh,  I  may,  because  I'm  little,  but  you  mustn't,  be- 
cause you're — (hesitates  for  a  delicate  expression  of  magnitude). 

L.  (rudely  taking  the  first  that  comes).  Because  I'm  big? 
No  ;  that's  not  the  way  of  it  at  all,  Florrie.  Because  you're 
little,  you  should  have  very  little  play ;  and  because  I'm  big 
I  should  have  a  great  deal. 

Isabel  and,  Florrie  (both).  No — no — no — no.  That  isn't  it 
at  all.  (Isabel  sola,  quoting  Hiss  Ingelow.)  '  The  lambs  play 
always — they  know  no  better.'  (Putting  her  head  very  much 
on  one  side.)  Ah,  now — please — please — tell  us  true  ;  we 
want  to  know. 

L.  But  why  do  you  want  me  to  tell  you  true,  any  more 
than  the  man  who  wrote  the  'Arabian  Nights?' 

Isabel.  Because — because  we  like  to  know  about  real 
things ;  and  you  can  tell  us,  and  we  can't  ask  the  man  who 
wrote  the  stories. 

L.  What  do  you  call  real  things  ? 

Isabel.  Now,  you  know!    Things  that  really  are. 

L.  Whether  you  can  see  them  or  not  ? 

Isabel.  Yes,  if  somebody  else  saw  them. 

L.  But  if  nobody  has  ever  seen  them  ? 

Isabel  (evading  the  point).  Well,  but,  you  know,  if  there 
were  a  real  Valley  of  Diamonds,  somebody  must  have  seen  it, 

L.  You  cannot  be  so  sure  of  that,  Isabel.  Many  people  go 
to  real  places,  and  never  see  them  ;  and  many  people  pass 
through  this  valley,  and  never  see  it. 

Florrie.  What  stupid  people  they  must  be  ! 

L.  No,  Florrie.  They  are  much  wiser  than  the  people 
who  do  see  it. 

May.  I  think  I  know  where  it  is. 

Isabel.  Tell  us  more  about  it,  and  then  we'll  guess. 


14 


THE  ETHICS  OF  THE  DUST. 


L.  Well.  There's  a  great  broad  road,  by  a  river-side,  lead 
ing  up  into  it. 

May  {gravely  cunning,  with  emphasis  on  the  last  word). 
Does  the  road  really  go  up  f 

L.  You  think  it  should  go  down  into  a  valley  ?  No,  it  goes 
ap  ;  this  is  a  valley  among  the  hills,  and  it  is  as  high  as  the 
clouds,  and  is  often  full  of  them  ;  so  that  even  the  people  who 
most  want  to  see  it,  cannot,  always. 

Isabel.  And  what  is  the  river  beside  the  road  like  ? 

L.  It  ought  to  be  very  beautiful,  because  it  flows  over 
diamond  sand — only  the  water  is  thick  and  red. 

Isabel.  Red  wrater  ? 

L.  It  isn't  all  water. 

May.  Oh,  please  never  mind  that,  Isabel,  just  now  ;  I  want 
to  hear  about  the  valley. 

L.  So  the  entrance  to  it  is  very  wide,  under  a  steep  rock  ; 
only  such  numbers  of  people  are  always  trying  to  get  in,  that 
they  keep  jostling  each  other,  and  manage  it  but  slowly. 
Some  weak  ones  are  pushed  back,  and  never  get  in  at  all ; 
and  make  great  moaning  as  they  go  away  :  but  perhaps  they 
are  none  the  worse  in  the  end. 

May.  And  when  one  gets  in,  what  is  it  like  ? 

L.  It  is  up  and  down,  broken  kind  of  ground :  the  road 
stops  directly ;  and  there  are  great  dark  rocks,  covered  all 
over  with  wild  gourds  and  wild  vines  ;  the  gourds,  if  you  cut 
them,  are  red,  with  black  seeds,  like  water-melons,  and  look 
ever  so  nice  ;  and  the  people  of  the  place  make  a  red  pottage 
of  them  :  but  you  must  take  care  not  to  eat  any  if  you  ever 
want  to  leave  the  valley  (though  I  believe  putting  plenty  of 
meal  in  it  makes  it  wholesome).  Then  the  wild  vines  have 
clusters  of  the  colour  of  amber  ;  and  the  people  of  the  coun- 
try say  they  are  the  grape  of  Eshcol  ;  and  sweeter  than  honey  . 
but,  indeed,  if  anybody  else  tastes  them,  they  are  like  gall. 
Then  there  are  thickets  of  bramble,  so  thorny  that  they  would 
be  cut  away  directly,  anywhere  else  ;  but  here  they  are  cov- 
ered with  little  cinque-foiled  blossoms  of  pure  silver ;  and, 
for  berries,  they  have  clusters  of  rubies.  Dark  rubies,  which 
you  only  see  are  red  after  gathering  them.    But  you  maj 


THE  VALLEY  OF  DIAMONDS. 


15 


fancy  what  blackberry  parties  the  children  have  !  Only  they 
get  their  frocks  and  hands  sadly  torn. 

Lily.  But  rubies  can't  spot  one's  frocks  as  blackberries 
do? 

L.  No  ;  but  I'll  tell  you  what  spots  them — the  mulberries. 
There  are  great  forests  of  them,  all  up  the  hills,  covered  with 
silkworms,  some  munching  the  leaves  so  loud  that  it  is  like 
mills  at  work  ;  and  some  spinning.  But  the  berries  are  the 
blackest  you  ever  saw ;  and,  wherever  they  fall,  they  stain  a 
deep  red  ;  and  nothing  ever  washes  it  out  again.  And  it  is 
their  juice,  soaking  through  the  grass,  which  makes  the  river 
so  red,  because  all  its  springs  are  in  this  wood.  And  the 
boughs  of  the  trees  are  twisted,  as  if  in  pain,  like  old  olive 
branches  ;  and  their  leaves  are  dark.  And  it  is  in  these 
forests  that  the  serpents  are  ;  but  nobody  is  afraid  of  them. 
They  have  fine  crimson  crests,  and  they  are  wreathed  about 
the  wild  branches,  one  in  every  tree,  nearly ;  and  they  are 
singing  serpents,  for  the  serpents  are,  in  this  forest,  what 
birds  are  in  ours. 

Florrie.  Oh,  I  don't  want  to  go  there  at  all,  now. 

L.  You  would  like  it  very  much  indeed,  Florrie,  if  you 
were  there.  The  serpents  would  not  bite  you  ;  the  only  fear 
would  be  of  your  turning  into  one  ! 

Florrie.  Oh,  dear,  but  that's  worse. 

L.  You  wouldn't  think  so  if  you  really  were  turned  into 
one,  Florrie  ;  you  would  be  very  proud  of  your  crest.  And 
as  long  as  you  were  yourself  (not  that  you  could  get  there  if 
you  remained  quite  the  little  Florrie  you  are  now),  you  would 
like  to  hear  the  serpents  sing.  They  hiss  a  little  through  it, 
like  the  cicadas  in  Italy  ;  but  they  keep  good  time,  and  sing 
delightful  melodies  ;  and  most  of  them  have  seven  heads, 
with  throats  which  each  take  a  note  of  the  octave  ;  so  that 
they  can  sing  chords — it  is  very  fine  indeed.  And  the  fire- 
flies fly  round  the  edge  of  the  forests  all  the  night  long  ;  you 
wade  in  fireflies,  they  make  the  fields  look  like  a  lake  trem- 
bling with  reflection  of  stars  ;  but  you  must  take  care  not  to 
touch  them,  for  they  are  not  like  Italian  fireflies,  but  bum- 
like  real  sparks. 


THE  ETHICS  OF  THE  DUST. 


Florrie.  I  don't  like  it  at  all ;  I'll  never  go  there. 

L.  I  hope  not,  Florrie  ;  or  at  least  that  you  will  get  out 
again  if  you  do.  And  it  is  very  difficult  to  get  out,  for  beyond 
these  serpent  forests  there  are  great  cliffs  of  dead  gold,  which 
form  a  labyrinth,  winding  always  higher  and  higher,  till  the 
gold  is  all  split  asunder  by  wedges  of  ice  ;  and  glaciers,  welded, 
half  of  ice  seven  times  frozen,  and  half  of  gold  seven  times 
frozen,  hang  down  from  them,  and  fall  in  thunder,  cleaving 
into  deadly  splinters,  like  the  Cretan  arrowheads  ;  and  into 
a  mixed  dust  of  snow  and  gold,  ponderous,  yet  which  the 
mountain  whirlwinds  are  able  to  lift  and  drive  in  wreaths 
and  pillars,  hiding  the  paths  with  a  burial  cloud,  fatal  at  once 
with  wintry  chill,  and  weight  of  golden  ashes.  So  the  wan- 
derers in  the  labyrinth  fall,  one  by  one,  and  are  buried  there: 
■ — yet,  over  the  drifted  graves,  those  who  are  spared  climb  to 
the  last,  through  coil  on  coil  of  the  path  ;— for  at  the  end  of  it 
they  see  the  king  of  the  valley,  sitting  on  his  throne  :  and  be- 
side him  (but  it  is  only  a  false  vision),  spectra  of  creatures 
like  themselves,  set  on  thrones,  from  which  they  seem  to  look 
down  on  all  the  kingdoms  of  the  world,  and  the  glory  of 
them.  And  on  the  canopy  of  his  throne  there  is  an  inscrip- 
tion in  fiery  letters,  which  they  strive  to  read,  but  cannot ;  for 
it  is  written  in  words  which  are  like  the  words  of  all  languages, 
and  yet  are  of  none.  Men  say  it  is  more  like  their  own 
tongue  to  the  English  than  it  is  to  any  other  nation  ;  but  the 
only  record  of  it  is  by  an  Italian,  who  heard  the  King  him  - 
self  cry  it  as  a  war  cry,  'Pape  Satan,  Pape  Satan  Aleppe.'  * 

Sibyl.  But  do  they  all  perish  there  ?  You  said  there  was 
a  way  through  the  valley,  and  out  of  it. 

L.  Yes  ;  but  few  find  it.  If  any  of  them  keep  to  the  grass 
paths,  where  the  diamonds  are  swept  aside  ;  and  hold  their 
hands  over  their  eyes  so  as  not  to  be  dazzled,  the  grass  paths 
lead  forward  gradually  to  a  place  where  one  sees  a  little  open- 
ing in  the  golden  rocks.  You  were  at  Chamouni  last  year, 
Sibyl ;  did  your  guide  chance  to  show  you  the  pierced  rock 
of  the  Aiguille  du  Midi  ? 

Sibyl.  No,  indeed,  we  only  got  up  from  Geneva  on  Monday 
*  Dante,  Inf.  7.  1. 


THE  VALLEY  GF  DIAMONDS. 


11 


night ;  and  it  rained  all  Tuesday  ;  and  we  had  to  be  back  at 
Geneva  again,  early  on  Wednesday  morning. 

L.  Of  course.  That  is  the  way  to  see  a  country  in  a  Sibyl- 
line manner,  by  inner  consciousness  :  but  you  might  have 
seen  the  pierced  rock  in  your  drive  up,  or  down,  if  the  clouds 
broke  :  not  that  there  is  much  to  see  in  it ;  one  of  the  crags 
of  the  aiguille-edge,  on  the  southern  slope  of  it,  is  struck 
sharply  through,  as  by  an  awl,  into  a  little  eyelet  hole  ;  which 
you  may  see,  seven  thousand  feet  above  the  valley  (as  the 
clouds  flit  past  behind  it,  or  leave  the  sky),  first  white,  and 
then  dark  blue.  Well,  there's  just  such  an  eyelet  hole  in  one 
of  the  upper  crags  of  the  Diamond  Valley ;  and,  from  a  dis- 
tance, you  think  that  it  is  no  bigger  than  the  eye  of  a  needle. 
But  if  you  get  up  to  it,  they  say  you  may  drive  a  loaded  camel 
through  it,  and  that  there  are  fine  things  on  the  other  side, 
but  I  have  never  spoken  with  anybody  who  had  been  through. 

Sibyl.  I  think  we  understand  it  now.  We  will  try  to  write 
it  down,  and  think  of  it. 

L.  Meantime,  Florrie,  though  all  that  I  have  been  telling 
you  is  very  true,  yet  you  must  not  think  the  sort  of  diamonds 
that  people  wear  in  rings  and  necklaces  are  found  lying  about 
on  the  grass.  Would  you  like  to  see  how  they  really  are 
found  ? 

Florrie.  Oh,  yes — yes. 

L.  Isabel — or  Lily — run  up  to  my  room  and  fetch  me  the 
little  box  with  a  glass  lid,  out  of  the  top  drawer  of  the  chest 
of  drawers.    {Race  between  Lily  and  Isabel.) 

(Re-enter  Isabel  with  the  box,  very  much  out  of  breath.  Lily 
behind.) 

L.  WThy,  you  never  can  beat  Lily  in  a  race  on  the  stairs,  can 
you,  Isabel? 

Isabel  (panting).  Lily — beat  me — ever  so  far— but  she  gave 
in  3 — the  box — to  carry  in. 

L.  Take  off  the  lid,  then  ;  gently. 

Florrie  (after  peeping  in,  disappointed).  There's  only  a  greai 
ugly  brown  stone  ! 

L.  Not  much  more  than  that,  certainly,  Florrie,  if  people 
were  wise.    But  look,  it  is  not  a  single  stone ;  but  a  knot  of 


18 


THE  ETHICS  OF  THE  DUST. 


pebbles  fastened  together  by  gravel ;  and  in  the  gravel,  oi 
compressed  sand,  if  you  look  close,  you  will  see  grains  of  gold 
glittering  everywhere,  all  through  ;  and  then,  do  you  see  these 
two  white  beads,  which  shine,  as  if  they  had  been  covered 
with  grease  ? 

Floerie.  May  I  touch  them  ? 

L.  Yes  ;  you  will  find  they  are  not  greasy,  only  very  smooth* 
Well,  those  are  the  fatal  jewels  ;  native  here  in  their  dust  with 
gold,  so  that  you  may  see,  cradled  here,  together,  the  two  great 
enemies  of  mankind, — the  strongest  of  all  malignant  physical 
powers  that  have  tormented  our  race. 

Sibyl.  Is  that  really  so  ?  I  know  they  do  great  harm  ;  but 
do  they  not  also  do  great  good  ? 

L.  My  dear  child,  what  good  ?  Was  any  woman,  do  you 
suppose,  ever  the  better  for  possessing  diamonds  ?  but  how 
many  have  been  made  base,  frivolous,  and  miserable  by  desir- 
ing them?  Was  ever  man  the  better  for  having  coffers  full  of 
gold?  But  who  shall  measure  the  guilt  that  is  incurred  to 
fill  them  ?  Look  into  the  history  of  any  civilised  nations ;  an- 
alyse, with  reference  to  this  one  cause  of  crime  and  misery, 
the  lives  and  thoughts  of  their  nobles,  priests,  merchants,  and 
men  of  luxurious  life.  Every  other  temptation  is  at  last  con- 
centrated into  this ;  pride,  and  last,  and  envy,  and  anger  all 
give  up  their  strength  to  avarice.  The  sin  of  the  whole  world 
is  essentially  the  sin  of  Judas.  Men  do  not  disbelieve  their 
Christ ;  but  they  sell  Him. 

Sibyl.  But  surely  that  is  the  fault  of  human  nature  ?  it  is 
not  caused  by  the  accident,  as  ifc  were,  of  there  being  a  pretty 
metal,  like  gold,  to  be  found  by  digging.  If  people  could  not 
find  that,  would  they  not  find  something  else,  and  quarrel  for 
it  instead  ? 

L.  No.  Wherever  legislators  have  succeeded  in  excluding, 
for  a  time,  jewels  and  precious  metals  from  among  national 
possessions,  the  national  spirit  has  remained  healthy.  Cove- 
tousness  is  not  natural  to  man — generosity  is  ;  but  covetous- 
ness  must  be  excited  by  a  special  cause,  as  a  given  disease  by 
a  given  miasma ;  and  the  essential  nature  of  a  material  for  the 
Excitement  of  covetousness  is,  that  it  shall  be  a  beautiful  thing 


THE  VALLEY  OF  DIAMONDS. 


19 


which  can  bo  retained  without  a  use.  The  moment  we  can  use 
our  possessions  to  any  good  purpose  ourselves,  the  instinct  of 
communicating  that  use  to  others  rise3  side  by  side  with  out 
power.  If  you  can  read  a  book  rightly,  you  will  want  others 
to  hear  it  ;  if  you  can  enjoy  a  picture  rightly,  you  will  want 
others  to  see  it :  learn  how  to  manage  a  horse,  a  plough,  or  a 
ship,  and  you  will  desire  to  make  your  subordinates  good 
horsemen,  ploughmen,  or  sailors  ;  you  will  never  be  able  to 
see  the  fine  instrument  you  are  master  of,  abused  ;  but,  once 
fix  your  desire  on  anything  useless,  and  all  the  purest  pride 
and  folly  in  your  heart  will  mix  with  the  desire,  and  make  you 
at  last  wholly  inhuman,  a  mere  ugly  lump  of  stomach  and 
suckers,  like  a  cuttle-fish. 

Sibyl.  But  surely,  these  two  beautiful  things,  gold  and  dia^ 
inoncls,  must  have  been  appointed  to  some  good  purpose  ? 

L.  Quite  conceivably  so,  my  dear  :  as  also  earthquakes  and 
pestilences  ;  but  of  such  ultimate  purposes  we  can  have  no 
sight.  The  practical,  immediate  office  of  the  earthquake  and 
pestilence  is  to  slay  us,  like  moths  ;  and,  as  moths,  we  shall  be 
wise  to  live  out  of  their  wTay.  So,  the  practical,  immediate 
office  of  gold  and  diamonds  is  the  multiplied  destruction  of 
souls  (in  whatever  sense  you  have  been  taught  to  understand 
that  phrase) ;  and  the  paralysis  of  wholesome  human  effort 
and  thought  on  the  face  of  God's  earth  :  and  a  wise  nation 
will  live  out  of  the  way  of  them.  The  money  which  the  Eng- 
lish habitually  spend  in  cutting  diamonds  wrould,  in  ten  years, 
if  it  were  applied  to  cutting  rocks  instead,  leave  no  dangerous 
reef  nor  difficult  harbour  round  the  whole  island  coast  Great 
Britain  would  be  a  diamond  worth  cutting,  indeed,  a  true 
piece  of  regalia.  (Leaves  this  to  their  thoughts  for  a  little  while.) 
Then,  also,  wre  poor  mineralogists  might  sometimes  have  the 
chance  of  seeing  a  fine  crystal  of  diamond  unhacked  by  the 
jeweller. 

Sibyl.  "Would  it  be  more  beautiful  uncut  ? 
L.  No  ;  but  of  infinite  interest.    We  might  even  come  to 
know  something  about  the  making  of  diamonds. 

Sibyl.  I  thought  the  chemists  could  make  them  already  ? 
L.  In  very  small  black  crystals,  yes;  but  no  one  knows  how 


20 


THE  ETHICS  OF  THE  DUST. 


they  are  formed  where  they  are  found  ;  or  if  indeed  they  are 
formed  there  at  ah.  These,  in  my  hand,  look  as  if  they  had 
been  swept  dowTn  with  the  gravel  and  gold  ;  only  we  can  trace 
the  gravel  and  gold  to  their  native  rocks,  but  not  the  dia- 
monds. Read  the  account  given  of  the  diamond  in  any  good 
wwk  on  mineralogy  ; — you  will  find  nothing  but  lists  of  locals 
ties  of  gravel,  or  conglomerate  rock  (which  is  only  an  old  in- 
durated gravel).  Some  say  it  was  once  a  vegetable  gum  ;  but 
it  may  have  been  charred  wood  ;  but  what  one  would  like  to 
know  is,  mainly,  why  charcoal  should  make  itself  into  dia- 
monds in  India,  and  only  into  black  lead  in  Borrowdale. 

Sibyl.  Are  they  wholly  the  same,  then  ? 

L.  There  is  a  little  iron  mixed  with  our  black  lead  but 
nothing  to  hinder  its  crystallisation.  Your  pencils  in  fact  are 
all  pointed  with  formless  diamond,  though  they  would  be 
h  h  h  pencils  to  purpose,  if  it  crystallised. 

Sibyl.  But  what  is  crystallisation  ? 

L.  A  pleasant  question,  when  one's  half  asleep,  and  it  has 
been  tea  time  these  two  hours.  What  thoughtless  things 
girls  are ! 

Sibyl.  Yes,  we  are  ;  but  we  want  to  know,  for  all  that, 

L.  My  dear,  it  would  take  a  week  to  tell  you. 

Sibyl.  Well,  take  it,  and  tell  us. 

L.  But  nobody  knows  anything  about  it. 

Sibyl.  Then  tell  us  something  that  nobody  knows. 

L.  Get  along  with  you,  and  tell  Dora  to  make  tea. 

(The  house  rises;  hut  of  course  the  Lecturer  wanted  He 
he  forced  to  lecture  again,  and  was,) 


LECTURE  II. 


THE  PYRAMID  BUILDERS. 

In  the  large  Schoolroom,  to  which  everybody  has  been  summoned  by 
ringing  of  the  great  bell. 

L.  So  you  have  all  actually  come  to  hear  about  crystallisa- 
tion !  I  cannot  conceive  why, unless  the  little  ones  think  that 
the  discussion  may  involve  some  reference  to  sugar-candy. 

(Symptoms  of  high  displeasure  among  the  younger  members 
of  council.  Isabel  frowns  severely  at  L.,  and  shakes  her 
head  violently.) 

My  dear  children,  if  you  knew  it,  you  are  }Tourselves,  at 
this  moment,  as  you  sit  in  your  ranks,  nothing,  in  the  eye  of 
a  mineralogist,  but  a  lovely  group  of  rosy  sugar-candy,  ar- 
ranged by  atomic  forces.  And  even  admitting  you  to  be 
something  more,  you  have  certainly  been  crystallising  with- 
out knowing  it.  Did  I  not  hear  a  great  hurrying  and  whis- 
pering, ten  minutes  ago,  when  you  were  late  in  from  the  play- 
ground ;  and  thought  you  would  not  all  be  quietly  seated  by 
the  time  I  was  ready : — besides  some  discussion  about  places 
— something  about  c  it's  not  being  fair  that  the  little  ones 
should  always  be  nearest  ? '  Well,  you  were  then  all  being 
crystallised.  When  you  ran  in  from  the  garden,  and  against 
one  another  in  the  passages,  you  were  in  what  mineralogists 
would  call  a  state  of  solution,  and  gradual  confluence  ;  when 
you  got  seated ,  in  those  orderly  rows,  each  in  her  proper 
place,  you  became  crystalline.  That  is  just  what  the  atoms  of 
a  mineral  do,  if  they  can,  whenever  they  get  disordered : 
they  get  into  order  again  as  soon  as  may  be. 

I  hope  you  feel  inclined  to  interrupt  me,  and  say,  6  But  we 
know  our  places  ;  how  do  the  atoms  know  theirs?  And  some- 


22 


THE  ETHICS  OF  THE  LUST. 


times  we  dispute  about  our  places  ;  do  the  atoms — (and,  be- 
sides, we  don't  like  being  compared  to  atoms  at  all) — neve? 
dispute  about  theirs?'  Two  wise  questions  these,  if  you  had 
a  mind  to  put  them  !  it  was  long  before  I  asked  them  myself, 
of  myself.  And  I  will  not  call  you  atoms  any  more.  May  I 
call  you— let  me  see — '  primary  molecules  ? '  ( General  distent 
indicated  in  subdued  but  decisive  murmurs  )  No  !  not  even,  in 
familiar  Saxon,  6  dust  ? % 

{Pause,  with  expression  on  faces  of  sorrowful  doubt;  Lil* 
gives  voice  to  the  general  sentiment  in  a  timid  '  Please 
don't:) 

No,  children,  I  won't  call  you  that  ;  and  mind,  as  you  grow 
up,  that  you  do  not  get  into  an  idle  and  wicked  habit  of  call- 
ing yourselves  that.  You  are  something  better  than  dust, 
and  have  other  duties  to  do  than  ever  dust  can  do  ;  and  the 
bonds  of  affection  you  will  enter  into  are  better  than  merely 
'  getting  into  order.'  But  see  to  it,  on  the  other  hand,  that 
you  always  behave  at  least  as  well  as  6  dust ; '  remember,  it  is 
only  on  compulsion,  and  while  it  has  no  free  permission  to  do 
as  it  likes,  that  it  ever  gets  out  of  order  ;  but  sometimes,  with 
some  of  us,  the  compulsion  has  to  be  the  other  way — hasn't 
it?  (Remonstrator  y  whispers,  expressive  of  opinion  that  the 
Lecturer  is  becoming  too  'personal.)  I'm  not  looking  at  any- 
body in  particular — indeed  I  am  not.  Nay,  if  you  blush  so, 
Kathleen,  how  can  one  help  looking?  We'll  go  back  to  the 
atoms. 

£  How  do  they  know  their  places  ? '  you  asked,  or  should 
have  asked.  Yes,  and  they  have  to  do  much  more  than  know 
them :  they  have  to  find  their  way  to  them,  and  that  quietly 
and  at  once,  without  running  against  each  other. 

We  may,  indeed,  state  it  briefly  thus  : — Suppose  you  have 
to  build  a  castle,  with  towers  and  roofs  and*  buttresses,  out 
of  bricks  of  a  given  shape,  and  that  these  bricks  are  all  lying 
in  a  huge  heap  at  the  bottom,  in  utter  confusion,  upset  out 
of  carts  at  random.  You  would  have  to  draw  a  great  many 
plans,  and  count  all  your  bricks,  and  be  sure  you  had  enough 
for  this  and  that  tower,  before  you  began,  and  then  you 


THE  PYRAMID  BUILDERS. 


23 


•isrould  have  to  lay  your  foundation,  and  add  layer  by  layer,  in 
order,  slowly. 

But  how  would  you  be  astonished,  in  these  melancholy 
days,  when  children  don't  read  children's  books,  nor  believe 
any  more  in  fairies,  if  suddenly  a  real  benevolent  fairy,  in  a 
bright  brick-red  gown,  were  to  rise  in  the  midst  of  the  red 
bricks,  and  to  tap  the  heap  of  them  with  her  wand,  and  say . 
6  Bricks,  bricks,  to  your  places ! '  and  then  you  saw  in  an 
instant  the  whole  heap  rise  in  the  air,  like  a  swarm  of  red 
bees,  and — you  have  been  used  to  see  bees  make  a  honey, 
comb,  and  to  think  that  strange  enough,  but  now  you  would 
see  the  honeycomb  make  itself ! — You  want  to  ask  something, 
Florrie,  by  the  look  of  your  eyes. 

Florrie.  Are  they  turned  into  real  bees,  with  stings? 

L.  No,  Florrie  ;  you  are  only  to  fancy  flying  bricks,  as  you 
saw  the  slates  flying  from  the  roof  the  other  day  in  the 
storm  ;  only  those  slates  didn't  seem  to  know  where  they 
were  going,  and,  besides,  were  going  where  they  had  no 
business :  but  my  spell-bound  bricks,  though  they  have  no 
wings,  and  what  is  worse,  no  heads  and  no  eyes,  yet  find 
their  way  in  the  air  just  where  they  should  settle,  into 
towers  and  roofs,  each  flying  to  his  place  and  fastening  there 
at  the  right  moment,  so  that  every  other  one  shall  fit  to  him 
in  his  turn. 

Lily.  But  who  are  the  fairies,  then,  who  build  the  crystals  ? 

L.  There  is  one  great  fairy,  Lily,  who  builds  much  more 
than  crystals  ;  but  she  builds  these  also.  I  dreamed  that  I 
saw  her  building  a  pyramid,  the  other  day,  as  she  used  to  do, 
for  the  Pharaohs. 

Isabel.  But  that  was  only  a  dream  ? 

L.  Some  dreams  are  truer  than  some  wakings,  Isabel ;  but 
I  won't  tell  it  you  unless  you  like. 
Isabel.  Oh,  please,  please. 

L.  You  are  all  such  wise  children,  there's  no  talking  to 
you  ;  you  won't  believe  anything. 

Lily.  No,  we  are  not  wise,  and  we  will  believe  anything, 
when  you  say  we  ought 

L.  Well,  it  came  about  this  way.    Sibyl,  do  you  recollect 


24 


THE  ETHICS  OF  TUB  DUST. 


that  evening  when  we  had  been  looking  at  your  old  cave  by 
Cuinae,  and  wondering  why  you  didn't  live  there  still ;  and 
then  we  wondered  how  old  you  were  ;  and  Egypt  said  you 
wouldn't  tell,  and  nobody  else  could  tell  but  she  ;  and  you 
laughed — I  thought  very  gaily  for  a  Sibyl — and  said  yo-& 
would  harness  a  flock  of  cranes  for  us,  and  we  might  fly  ovei 
to  Egypt  if  we  liked,  and  see. 

Sibyl.  Yes,  and  you  went,  and  couldn't  find  out  after  all ! 

L.  Why,  you  know,  Egypt  had  been  just  doubling  that 
third  pyramid  of  hers  ;  *  and  making  a  new  entrance  into  it ; 
and  a  fine  entrance  it  was !  First,  we  had  to  go  through  an 
ante-room,  which  had  both  its  doors  blocked  up  with  stones ; 
and  then  we  had  three  granite  portcullises  to  pull  up,  one 
after  another ;  and  the  moment  wTe  had  got  under  them, 
Egypt  signed  to  somebody  above  ;  and  down  they  came 
again  behind  us,  with  a  roar  like  thunder,  only  louder ;  then 
we  got  into  a  passage  fit  for  nobody  but  rats,  and  Egypt 
wouldn't  go  any  further  herself,  but  said  we  might  go  on  if 
we  liked ;  and  so  we  came  to  a  hole  in  the  pavement,  and 
then  to  a  granite  trap-door — and  then  we  thought  we  had 
gone  quite  far  enough,  and  came  back,  and  Egypt  laughed 
at  us. 

Egypt.  You  would  not  have  had  me  take  my  crown  off, 
and  stoop  all  the  way  down  a  passage  fit  only  for  rats? 

L.  It  was  not  the  crown,  Egypt — you  know  that  very  well. 
It  was  the  flounces  that  would  not  let  you  go  any  farther.  I 
suppose,  however,  you  wear  them  as  typical  of  the  inunda- 
tion of  the  Nile,  so  it  is  all  right. 

Isabel.  Why  didn't  you  take  me  with  you?-  Where  rats 
can  go,  mice  can.    I  wouldn't  have  come  back. 

L.  No,  mousie  ;  you  would  have  gone  on  by  yourself,  and 
you  might  have  wTaked  one  of  Pasht's  cats,f  and  it  would 
have  eaten  you.  I  was  very  glad  you  were  not  there.  But 
after  all  this,  I  suppose  the  imagination  of  the  heavy  granite 
blocks  and  the  underground  ways  had  troubled  me,  and 
dreams  are  often  shaped  in  a  strange  opposition  to  the  im- 
pressions that  have  caused  them ;  and  from  all  that  we  had 
*  Note  i.  f  Note  iii. 


THE  PYRAMID  BUILDERS. 


25 


been  reading  in  Bunsen  about  stones  that  couldn't  be  lifted 
with  levers,  I  began  to  dream  about  stones  that  lifted  them- 
selves with  wings. 

Sibyl.  Now  you  must  just  tell  us  all  about  it 

L.  I  dreamed  that  I  was  standing  beside  the  lake,  out  of 
whose  clay  the  bricks  were  made  for  the  great  pyramid  of 
isychis.*  They  had  just  been  all  finished,  and  were  lying 
by  the  lake  margin,  in  long  ridges,  like  waves.  It  was  near 
evening  ;  and  as  I  looked  towards  the  sunset,  I  saw  a  thing 
like  a  dark  pillar  standing  where  the  rock  of  the  desert  stoops 
to  the  Nile  valley.  I  did  not  know  there  was  a  pillar  there, 
and  wondered  at  it ;  and  it  grew  larger,  and  glided  nearer, 
becoming  like  the  form  of  a  man,  but  vast,  and  it  did  not 
move  its  feet,  but  glided  like  a  pillar  of  sand.  And  as  it  drew 
nearer,  I  looked  by  chance  past  it,  towards  the  sun  ;  and  saw 
a  silver  cloud,  which  was  of  all  the  clouds  closest  to  the  sun 
(and  in  one  place  crossed  it),  draw  itself  back  from  the  sun, 
suddenly.  And  it  turned,  and  shot  towards  the  dark  pillar  ; 
leaping  in  an  arch,  like  an  arrow  out  of  a  bow.  And  I 
thought  it  was  lightning ;  but  when  it  came  near  the  shadowy 
pillar,  it  sank  slowly  down  beside  it,  and  changed  into  the 
shape  of  a  woman,  very  beautiful,  and  with  a  strength  of 
deep  calm  in  her  blue  eyes.  She  was  robed  to  the  feet  with 
a  white  robe ;  and  above  that,  to  her  knees,  by  the  cloud 
which  I  had  seen  across  the  sun  ;  but  all  the  golden  ripples 
of  it  had  become  plumes,  so  that  it  had  changed  into  two 
bright  wings  like  those  of  a  vulture,  wThich  wrapped  round 
her  to  her  knees.  She  had  a  weaver's  shuttle  hanging  over 
her  shoulder,  by  the  thread  of  it,  and  in  her  left  hand,  ar- 
rows, tipped  with  fire. 

Isabel  (clapping  her  hands).  Oh !  it  was  Neith,  it  was 
Keith  !  I  know  now. 

L.  Yes  ;  it  was  Neith  herself ;  and  as  the  two  great  spirits 
came  nearer  to  me,  I  saw  they  were  the  Brother  and  Sister— 
the  pillared  shadow  was  the  Greater  Pthaht  And  I  heard 
them  speak,  and  the  sound  of  their  words  was  like  a  distant 
singing.  I  could  not  understand  the  wTords  one  by  one ;  yei 
*  Note  ii.  t  Note  hi 


26 


THE  ETHICS  OF  THE  DUST. 


their  sense  came  to  me  ;  and  so  I  knew  that  Neith  had  come 
down  to  see  her  brother's  work,  and  the  work  that  he  had 
put  into  the  mind  of  the  king  to  make  his  servants  do.  And 
she  was  displeased  at  it ;  because  she  saw  only  pieces  of  dark 
clay :  and  no  porphyry,  nor  marble,  nor  any  fair  stone  that 
men  might  engrave  the  figures  of  the  gods  upon.  And  she 
blamed  her  brother,  and  said,  '  Oh,  Lord  of  truth !  is  this 
then  thy  will,  that  men  should  mould  only  four-square  pieces 
of  clay :  and  the  forms  of  the  gods  no  more  ? '  Then  the 
Lord  of  truth  sighed,  and  said,  '  Oh !  sister,  in  truth  they  do 
not  love  us  ;  why  should  they  set  up  our  images  ?  Let  them 
do  what  they  may,  and  not  lie — let  them  make  their  clay 
four-square  ;  and  labour  ;  and  perish/ 

Then  Neith's  dark  blue  eyes  grew  darker,  and  she  said, 
'  Oh,  Lord  of  truth !  why  should  they  love  us  ?  their  love  is 
vain  ;  or  fear  us?  for  their  fear  is  base.  Yet  let  them  testify 
of  us,  that  they  knew  we  lived  for  ever/ 

But  the  Lord  of  truth  answered,  '  They  know,  and  yet  they 
know  not.  Let  them  keep  silence  ;  for  their  silence  only  is 
truth.' 

But  Neith  answered,  ' Brother,  wilt  thou  also  make  league 
with  Death,  because  Death  is  true  ?  Oh !  thou  potter,  who 
hast  cast  these  human  things  from  thy  wheel,  many  to  dis- 
honour, and  few  to  honour  ;  wilt  thou  not  let  them  so  much 
as  see  my  face  ;  but  slay  them  in  slavery?' 

But  Pthah  only  answered,  '  Let  them  build,  sister,  let  them 
build.' 

And  Neith  answered,  '  "What  shall  they  build,  if  I  build  not 
with  them  ? ' 

And  Pthah  drew  with  his  measuring  rod  upon  the  sand, 
And  I  saw  suddenly,  drawn  on  the  sand,  the  outlines  of  great 
cities,  and  of  vaults,  and  domes,  and  aqueducts,  and  bastions, 
and  towers,  greater  than  obelisks,  covered  with  black  clouds. 
And  the  wind  blew  ripples  of  sand  amidst  the  lines  that 
Pthah  drew,  and  the  moving  sand  was  like  the  marching  of 
men.  But  I  saw  that  wherever  Neith  looked  at  the  lines, 
they  faded,  and  were  effaced. 

<  Oh,  Brother  ! '  she  said  at  last,  '  what  is  this  vanity  ?   If  I, 


THE  PYRAMID  BUILDERS. 


27 


who  am  Lady  of  wisdom,  do  not  mock  the  children  of  men, 
wThy  shouldst  thou  mock  them,  who  art  Lord  of  truth  ? '  But 
Pthah  answered,  '  They  thought  to  bind  me  ;  and  they  shall 
be  bound.    They  shall  labour  in  the  fire  for  vanity. ' 

And  Neith  said,  looking  at  the  sand,  'Brother,  there  is  no 
true  labour  here — there  is  only  wTeary  life  and  wasteful 
death.' 

And  Pthah  answered,  c  Is  it  not  truer  labour,  sister,  than 
thy  sculpture  of  dreams?' 

Then  Neith  smiled  ;  and  stopped  suddenly. 

She  looked  to  the  sun  ;  its  edge  touched  the  horizon -edge 
of  the  desert.  Then  she  looked  to  the  long  heaps  of  pieces 
of  clay,  that  lay,  each  with  its  blue  shadow,  by  the  lake 
shore. 

'Brother,'  she  said,  £how  long  will  this  pyramid  of  thine  be 
in  building? ' 

i  Thoth  will  have  sealed  the  scroll  of  the  years  ten  times, 
before  the  summit  is  laid.' 

1  Brother,  thou  knowest  not  how  to  teach  thy  children  to 
labour,'  answered  Neith.  1  Look !  I  must  follow  Phre  be- 
yond Atlas  ;  shall  I  build  your  pyramid  for  you  before  he 
goes  down  ? '  And  Pthah  answered,  '  Yea,  sister,  if  thou 
canst  put  thy  winged  shoulders  to  such  work.'  And  Neith 
drew  herself  to  her  height ;  and  I  heard  a  clashing  pass 
through  the  plumes  of  her  wings,  and  the  asp  stood  up  on 
her  helmet,  and  fire  gathered  in  her  eyes.  And  she  took  one 
of  the  flaming  arrows  out  of  the  sheaf  in  her  left  hand,  and 
stretched  it  out  over  the  heaps  of  clay.  And  they  rose  up 
like  flights  of  locusts,  and  spread  themselves  in  the  air,  so 
that  it  grew  dark  in  a  moment.  Then  Neith  designed  them 
places  with  her  arrow  point ;  and  they  drew  into  ranks,  like 
dark  clouds  laid  level  at  morning.  Then  Neith  pointed  with 
her  arrow  to  the  north,  and  to  the  south,  and  to  the  east,  and 
to  the  west,  and  the  flying  motes  of  earth  drew  asunder  into 
four  great  ranked  crowds  ;  and  stood,  one  in  the  north,  and 
one  in  the  south,  and  one  in  the  east,  and  one  in  the  wrest— - 
one  against  another.  Then  Neith  spread  her  wings  wide  for 
an  instant,  and  closed  them  with  a  sound  like  the  sound  of 


28 


THE  ETHICS  OF  THE  DUST. 


a  rushing  sea  ;  and  waved  her  hand  towards  the  foundation 
of  the  pyramid,  where  it, was  laid  on  the  brow  of  the  desert. 
And  the  four  flocks  drew  together  and  sank  down,  like  sea- 
birds  settling  to  a  level  rock  ;  and  when  they  met,  there  was 
a  sudden  flame,  as  broad  as  the  pyramid,  and  as  high  as  the 
clouds ;  and  it  dazzled  me ;  and  I  closed  my  eyes  for  an  in- 
stant ;  and  wrhen  I  looked  again,  the  pyramid  stood  on  its 
rock,  perfect ;  and  purple  writh  the  light  from  the  edge  of  the 
sinking  sun. 

The  younger  Children  (variously  pleased).  Tm  so  glad  ! 
How  nice  !    But  what  did  Pthah  say  ? 

L.  Neith  did  not  wait  to  hear  wThat  he  would  say.  When 
I  turned  back  to  look  at  her,  she  was  gone  ;  and  I  only  sawr 
the  level  white  cloud  form  itself  again,  close  to  the  arch  of 
the  sun  as  it  sank.  And  as  the  last  edge  of  the  sun  disap- 
peared, the  form  of  Pthah  faded  into  a  mighty  shadow,  and 
so  passed  awa}^. 

Egypt.  And  was  Neith's  pyramid  left  ? 

L.  Yes ;  but  you  could  not  think,  Egypt,  what  a  strange 
feeling  of  utter  loneliness  came  over  me  when  the  presence 
of  the  two  gods  passed  awTay.  It  seemed  as  if  I  had  never 
known  what  it  was  to  be  alone  before  ;  and  the  unbroken 
line  of  the  desert  was  terrible. 

Egypt.  I  used  to  feel  that,  when  I  wras  queen  :  sometimes 
I  had  to  carve  gods,  for  company,  all  over  my  palace.  I 
would  fain  have  seen  real  ones,  if  I  could. 

L.  But  listen  a  moment  yet,  for  that  was  not  quite  all  my 
dream.  The  twilight  drew  swiftly  to  the  dark,  and  I  could 
hardly  see  the  great  pyramid  ;  when  there  came  a  heavv 
murmuring  sound  in  the  air  ;  and  a  horned  beetle,  with  ter- 
rible claws,  fell  on  the  sand  at  my  feet,  with  a  blow  like  the 
beat  of  a  hammer.  Then  it  stood  up  on  its  hind  claws,  and 
waved  its  pincers  at  me :  and  its  fore  claws  became  strong 
arms,  and  hands ;  one  grasping  real  iron  pincers,  and  the 
other  a  huge  hammer  ;  and  it  had  a  helmet  on  its  head,  with- 
out any  eyelet  holes,  that  I  could  see.  And  its  two  hind 
claws  became  strong  crooked  legs,  with  feet  bent  inwards. 
And  so  there  stood  by  me  a  dwarf,  in  glossy  black  armour. 


THE  PYRAMID  BUILDERS. 


29 


ribbed  and  embossed  like  a  beetle's  back,  leaning  on  his  ham< 
mer.  And  I  could  not  speak  for  wonder ;  but  he  spoke  with 
a  murmur  like  the  dying  away  of  a  beat  upon  a  bell.  He 
said,  ( I  will  make  Neith's  great  pyramid  small.  I  am  the 
lower  Pthah  ;  and  have  power  over  fire.  I  can  wither  the 
strong  things,  and  strengthen  the  weak  ;  and  everything  that 
is  great  I  can  make  small,  and  everything  that  is  little  I  can 
make  great/  Then  he  turned  to  the  angle  of  the  pyramid 
and  limped  towards  it.  And  the  pyramid  grew  deep  purple  ; 
and  then  red  like  blood,  and  then  pale  rose-colour,  like  fire. 
And  I  saw  that  it  glowed  with  fire  from  within.  And  the 
lower  Pthah  touched  it  with  the  hand  that  held  the  pincers  ; 
and  it  sank  down  like  the  sand  in  an  hour-glass, — then  drew 
itself  together,  and  sank,  still,  and  became  nothing,  it  seemed 
to  me  ;  but  the  armed  dwarf  stooped  down,  and  took  it  into 
his  hand,  and  brought  it  to  me,  saying,  c  Everything  that  is 
great  I  can  make  like  this  pyramid  ;  and  give  into  men's 
hands  to  destroy.'  And  I  saw  that  he  had  a  little  pyramid  in 
his  hand,  with  as  many  courses  in  it  as  the  large  one  ;  and 
built  like  that,  only  so  small.  And  because  it  glowed  still,  I 
was  afraid  to  touch  it ;  but  Pthah  said,  £  Touch  it — for  I  have 
bound  the  fire  within  it,  so  that  it  cannot  burn.'  So  i 
touched  it,  and  took  it  into  my  own  hand  ;  and  it  was  cold  ; 
only  red,  like  a  ruby.  And  Pthah  laughed,  and  became  like 
a  beetle  again,  and  buried  himself  in  the  sand,  fiercely  ; 
throwing  it  back  over  his  shoulders.  And  it  seemed  to  me  as 
if  he  would  draw  me  down  with  him  into  the  sand  ;  and  I 
started  back,  and  woke,  holding  the  little  pyramid  so  fast  in 
my  hand  that  it  hurt  me. 

Egypt.  Holding  what  in  your  hand  ? 

L.  The  little  pyramid. 

Egypt.  Neith's  pyramid  ? 

L.  Neith's,  I  believe  ;  though  not  built  for  Asychis.  I 
know  only  that  it  is  a  little  rosy  transparent  pyramid,  built 
of  more  courses  of  bricks  than  I  can  count,  it  being  made  so 
small.  You  don't  believe  me,  of  course,  Egyptian  infidel ; 
but  there  it  is.    (Giving  crystal  of  rose  Fluor.) 


so 


THE  ETHICS  OF  THE  DUST. 


(Confused  examination  by  crowded  audience,  over*  each 
other's  shoidders  and  under  each  other's  arms.  Disap* 
pointment  begins  to  manifest  itself.) 

Sibyl  (not  quite  knowing  why  she  and  others  are  disappointed\ 
But  you  showed  us  this  the  other  day  ! 

L.  Yes  ;  but  you  would  not  look  at  it  the  other  day. 

Sibyl.  But  was  all  that  fine  dream  only  about  this? 

L.  What  finer  thing  could  a  dream  be  about  than  this? 
It  is  small,  if  you  will  ;  but  when  you  begin  to  think  of  things 
rightly,  the  ideas  of  smailness  and  largeness  pass  away.  The 
making  of  this  pyramid  was  in  reality  just  as  wonderful  as 
the  dream  I  have  been  telling  you,  and  just  as  incomprehen- 
sible. It  was  not,  I  suppose,  as  swift,  but  quite  as  grand 
things  are  done  as  swiftly.  When  Neith  makes  crystals  of 
snow,  it  needs  a  great  deal  more  marshalling  of  the  atoms, 
by  her  flaming  arrows,  than  it  does  to  make  crystals  like  this 
one  ;  and  that  is  done  in  a  moment. 

Egypt.  But  how  you  do  puzzle  us  !  Why  do  you  say  Neith 
does  it  ?    You  don't  mean  that  she  is  a  real  spirit,  do  you  ? 

L.  WThat  /  mean,  is  of  little  consequence.  What  the  Egyp- 
tians meant,  who  called  her  £  Neith,' — or  Homer,  who  called 
her  '  Athena,' — or  Solomon,  who  called  her  by  a  word  which 
the  Greeks  render  as  'Sophia,'  you  must  judge  for  yourselves. 
But  her  testimony  is  always  the  same,  and  all  nations  have 
received  it :  £I  was  by  Him  as  one  brought  up  with  Him,  and 
I  was  daily  His  delight ;  rejoicing  in  the  habitable  parts  oi 
the  earth,  and  my  delights  were  with  the  sons  of  men/ 

Mary.  But  is  not  that  only  a  personification  ? 

L.  If  it  be,  what  will  you  gain  by  unpersonifying  it,  or 
what  right  have  you  to  do  so  ?  Cannot  you  accept  the  imago 
given  you,  in  its  life  :  and  listen,  like  children,  to  the  words 
which  chiefly  belong  to  you  as  children  :  '  I  love  them  that 
love  me,  and  those  that  seek  me  early  shall  find  me  ? ' 

(They  are  all  quiet  for  a  minute  or  two  ;  questions  begin 
to  appear  in  their  eyes.) 

I  cannot  talk  to  you  any  more  to-day.  Take  that  rose- 
erystal  away  with  you,  and  think. 


OICTITKB  HI 


THE  CRYSTAL  LIFE. 

A  very  dull  Lecture,  wilfully  brought  upon  themselves  by  the  elder  children 
Some  of  the  young  ones  have,  however,  managed  to  get  in  by  mistake* 
Scene,  the  Schoolroom. 

L.  So  I  am  to  stand  up  here  merely  to  be  asked  questions, 
to-day,  Miss  Mary,  am  I  ? 

Mary.  Yes ;  and  you  must  answer  them  plainly  ;  without 
telling  us  any  more  stories.  You  are  quite  spoiling  the  chil- 
dren :  the  poor  little  things'  heads  are  turning  round  like 
kaleidoscopes  ;  and  they  don't  know  in  the  least  what  you 
mean.  Nor  do  we  old  ones,  either,  for  that  matter:  to-day 
you  must  really  tell  us  nothing  but  facts. 

L.  I  am  sworn  ;  but  you  won't  like  it,  a  bit. 

Mary.  Now,  first  of  all,  what  do  you  mean  by  '  bricks?' — - 
Are  the  smallest  particles  of  minerals  all  of  some  accurate 
shape,  like  bricks  ? 

L.  I  do  not  know,  Miss  Mary  ;  I  do  not  even  know  if  any- 
body knows.  The  smallest  atoms  which  are  visibly  and  prac- 
tically put  together  to  make  large  crystals,  may  better  be 
described  as  'limited  in  fixed  directions'  than  as  4 of  fixed 
forms/  But  I  can  tell  you  nothing  clear  about  ultimate 
atoms  :  you  will  find  the  idea  of  little  bricks,  or,  perhaps,  of 
little  spheres,  available  for  all  the  uses  you  will  have  to  put 
it  to. 

Mary.  Well,  it's  very  provoking  ;  one  seems  always  to  be 
stopped  just  when  one  is  coming  to  the  very  thing  one  wants 
to  know. 

L.  No,  Mary,  for  we  should  not  wish  to  know  anything  but 
what  is  easily  and  assuredly  knowable.  There's  no  end  to  it 
If  I  could  show  you,  or  myself,  a  group  of  ultimate  atoms, 


32 


THE  ETHICS  OF  THE  DUST. 


quite  clearly,  in  this  magnifying  glass,  we  should  both  be 
presently  vexed  because  we  could  not  break  them  in  two 
pieces,  and  see  their  insides. 

Mary.  Well  then,  next,  what  do  you  mean  by  the  flying  of 
the  bricks  ?    What  is  it  the  atoms  do,  that  is  like  flying  ? 

L.  When  they  are  dissolved,  or  uncrystallised,  they  are 
really  separated  from  each  other,  like  a  swarm  of  gnats  in  the 
air,  or  like  a  shoal  of  fish  in  the  sea ; — generally  at  about 
equal  distances.  In  currents  of  solutions,  or  at  different 
depths  of  them,  one  part  may  be  more  full  of  the  dissolved 
atoms  than  another ;  but  on  the  whole,  you  may  think  of 
them  as  equidistant,  like  the  spots  in  the  print  of  your  gown. 
If  they  are  separated  by  force  of  heat  only,  the  substance  is 
said  to  be  melted  ;  if  they  are  separated  by  any  other  sul> 
stance,  as  particles  of  sugar  by  water,  they  are  said  to  be 
6  dissolved.'    Note  this  distinction  carefully,  all  of  you. 

Dora.  I  will  be  very  particular.  When  next  you  tell  me 
there  isn't  sugar  enough  in  your  tea,  I  will  say,  '  It  is  not  yet 
dissolved,  sir.' 

L.  I  tell  you  what  shall  be  dissolved,  Miss  Dora  ;  and  that's 
the  present  parliament,  if  the  members  get  too  saucy. 

(Dora  folds  her  hands  and  casts  down  her  eyes.) 

L.  (proceeds  in  state).  Now,  Miss  Mary,  you  know  already, 
I  believe,  that  nearly  everything  will  melt,  under  a  sufficient 
heat,  like  wax.  Limestone  melts  (under  pressure);  sand 
melts  ;  granite  melts  ;  the  lava  of  a  volcano  is  a  mixed  mass 
of  many  kinds  of  rocks,  melted  :  and  any  melted  substance 
nearly  always,  if  not  always,  crystallises  as  it  cools  ;  the  more 
slowly  the  more  perfectly.  Water  melts  at  what  we  call  the 
freezing,  but  might  just  as  wisely,  though  not  as  conveniently, 
call  the  melting,  point ;  and  radiates  as  it  cools  into  the  most 
beautiful  of  all  known  crystals.  Glass  melts  at  a  greater  heat, 
and  will  crystallise,  if  you  let  it  cool  slowly  enough,  in  stars, 
much  like  snow.  Gold  needs  more  heat  to  melt  it,  but  crys- 
tallises also  exquisitely,  as  I  will  presently  show  you.  Arsenic 
and  sulphur  crystallise  from  their  vapours.  Now  in  any  of 
these  cases,  either  of  melted,  dissolved,  or  vaporous  bodies, 


THE  CRYSTAL  LIFE. 


33 


the  particles  are  usually  separated  from  each  other,  either  by 
heat,  or  by  an  intermediate  substance  ;  and  in  crystallis- 
ing they  are  both  brought  nearer  to  each  other,  and  packed, 
so  as  to  fit  as  closely  as  possible  :  the  essential  part  of  the 
business  being  not  the  bringing  together,  but  the  packing. 
Who  packed  your  trunk  for  you,  last  holidays,  Isabel  ? 
Isabel.  Lily  does,  always. 

L.  And  how  much  can  you  allow  for  Lily's  good  packing, 
in  guessing  what  will  go  into  the  trunk  ? 

Isabel.  Oh  !  I  bring  twice  as  much  as  the  trunk  holds. 
Lily  always  gets  everything  in. 

Lily.  Ah  !  but,  Isey,  if  you  only  knew  what  a  time  it  takes ! 
and  since  you've  had  those  great  hard  buttons  on  your  frocks, 
I  can't  do  anything  w7ith  them.  Buttons  won't  go  anywhere, 
you  know. 

L.  Yes,  Lily,  it  would  be  well  if  she  only  knew  what  a  time 
it  takes  ;  and  I  wish  any  of  us  knew  what  a  time  crystallisa- 
tion takes,  for  that  is  consummately  fine  packing.  The  parti- 
cles of  the  rock  are  thrown  down,  just  as  Isabel  brings  her 
things — in  a  heap  ;  and  innumerable  Lilies,  not  of  the  valley, 
but  of  the  rock,  come  to  pack  them.  But  it  takes  such  a 
time  ! 

However,  the  best — out  and  out  the  best — way  of  under- 
standing the  thing,  is  to  crystallise  yourselves. 
The  Audience.  Ourselves ! 

L.  Yes  ;  not  merely  as  you  did  the  other  day,  carelessly, 
on  the  schoolroom  forms  ;  but  carefully  and  finely,  out  in  the 
playground.  You  can  play  at  crystallisation  there  as  much  as 
you  please. 

Kathleen  and  Jessie.  Oh  !  how  ? — how  ? 

L.  First,  you  must  put  yourselves  together,  as  close  as  you 
can,  in  the  middle  of  the  grass,  and  form,  for  first  practice, 
any  figure  you  like. 

Jessie.  Any  dancing  figure,  do  you  mean  ? 

L.  No  ;  I  mean  a  square,  or  a  cross,  or  a  diamond.  Any 
figure  you  like,  standing  close  together.  You  had  better  out- 
line it  first  on  the  turf,  with  sticks,  or  pebbles,  so  as  to  see 
that  it  is  rightly  drawn  ;  then  get  into  it  and  enlarge  or  dimin* 


84 


THE  ETHICS  OF  THE  DUST. 


ish  it  at  one  side,  till  you  are  all  quite  in  it,  and  no  empty 
space  left. 

Doha.  Crinoline  and  all  ? 

L.  The  crinoline  may  stand  eventually  for  rough  crystalline 
surface,  unless  you  pin  it  in  ;  and  then  you  may  make  a  pol- 
ished crystal  of  yourselves. 

Lily.  Oh,  we'll  pin  it  in — we'll  pin  it  in  ! 

L.  Then,  when  you  are  all  in  the  figure,  let  every  one  note 
her  place,  and  who  is  next  her  on  each  side  ;  and  let  the  out- 
siders count  how  many  places  they  stand  from  the  corners. 

Kathleen.  Yes,  yes, — and  then? 

L.  Then  you  must  scatter  all  over  the  playground — right 
over  it  from  side  to  side,  and  end  to  end  ;  and  put  yourselves 
all  at  equal  distances  from  each  other,  everywhere.  You 
needn't  mind  doing  it  very  accurately,  but  so  as  to  be  nearly 
equidistant ;  not  less  than  about  three  yards  apart  from  each 
other,  on  every  side. 

Jessie.  "We  can  easily  cut  pieces  of  string  of  equal  length, 
to  hold.    And  then  ? 

L.  Then,  at  a  given  signal,  let  everybody  walk,  at  the  same 
rate,  towards  the  outlined  figure  in  the  middle.  You  had 
better  sing  as  you  walk  ;  that  will  keep  you  in  good  time. 
And  as  you  close  in  towards  it,  let  each  take  her  place,  and 
the  next  comers  fit  themselves  in  beside  the  first  ones,  till  you 
are  all  in  the  figure  again. 

Kathleen.  Oh  !  how  we  shall  run  against  each  other  !  "What 
fun  it  will  be  ! 

L.  No,  no,  Miss  Katie  ;  I  can't  allow  any  running  against 
each  other.  The  atoms  never  do  that,  whatever  human  creat- 
ures do.  You  must  all  know  your  places,  and  find  your  way 
to  them  without  jostling. 

Lmr.  But  how  ever  shall  we  do  that  ? 

Isabel.  Mustn't  the  ones  in  the  middle  be  the  nearest,  and 
the  outside  ones  farther  off — when  we  go  away  to  scatter,  I 
mean  ? 

L.  Yes  ;  you  must  be  very  careful  to  keep  your  order  ;  you 
will  soon  find  out  how  to  do  it ;  it  is  only  like  soldiers  form- 
ing square,  except  that  each  must  stand  still  in  her  place 


THE  CRYSTAL  LIFE. 


35 


as  she  reaches  it,  and  the  others  come  round  her ;  and  you 
will  have  much  more  complicated  figures,  afterwards,  to  form, 
than  squares. 

Isabel.  Ill  put  a  stone  at  my  place  :  then  I  shall  know  it. 

L.  You  might  each  nail  a  bit  of  paper  to  the  turf,  at  your 
place,  with  your  name  upon  it  :  but  it  wrould  be  of  no  usef 
for  if  you  don't  know  your  places,  you  will  make  a  fine  piece 
of  business  of  it,  while  you  are  looking  for  your  names. 
And,  Isabe],  if  with  a  little  head,  and  eyes,  and  a  brain  (all 
of  them  very  good  and  serviceable  of  their  kind,  as  such 
things  go),  you  think  you  cannot  know  your  place  without  a 
stone  at  it,  after  examining  it  well, — how  do  you  think  each 
atom  knows  its  place,  when  it  never  was  there  before,  and 
there's  no  stone  at  it  ? 

Isabel.  But  does  every  atom  know  its  place  ? 

L.  How  else  could  it  get  there  ? 

Mary.  Are  they  not  attracted  to  their  places  ? 

L.  Cover  a  piece  of  paper  with  spots,  at  equal  intervals ; 
and  then  imagine  any  kind  of  attraction  you  choose,  or  any 
law  of  attraction,  to  exist  between  the  spots,  and  try  how,  on 
that  permitted  supposition,  you  can  attract  them  into  the 
figure  of  a  Maltese  cross,  in  the  middle  of  the  paper. 

Mary  (havijig  tried  it).  Yes  ;  I  see  that  I  cannot : — one 
would  need  all  kinds  of  attractions,  in  different  ways,  at  dif- 
ferent places.    But  you  do  not  mean  that  the  atoms  are  alive  ? 

L.  What  is  it  to  be  alive  ? 

Dora.  There  now  ;  you're  going  to  be  provoking,  I  know. 

L.  I  do  not  see  why  it  should  be  provoking  to  be  asked 
what  it  is  to  be  alive.  Do  you  think  you  don't  know  whether 
you  are  alive  or  not  ? 

(Isabel  skips  to  the  end  of  the  room  and  back.) 

L.  Yes,  Isabel,  that's  all  very  fine  ;  and  you  and  I  may  call 
that  being  alive  :  but  a  modern  philosopher  calls  it  being  in  a 
6  mode  of  motion. '  It  requires  a  certain  quantity  of  heat  to 
take  you  to  the  sideboard  ;  and  exactly  the  same  quantity  to 
bring  you  back  again.    That's  all. 

Isabel.  No,  it  isn't.    And  besides,  I'm  not  hot. 


36 


THE  ETHICS  OF  THE  DUST. 


L.  I  am,  sometimes,  at  the  way  they  talk.  However,  you 
know,  Isabel,  you  might  have  been  a  particle  of  a  mineral,  and 
yet  have  been  carried  round  the  room,  or  anywhere  else,  by 
chemical  forces,  in  the  liveliest  way. 

Isabel.  Yes  ;  but  I  wasn't  carried  :  I  carried  myself. 

L.  The  fact  is,  mousie,  the  difficulty  is  not  so  much  to  say 
what  makes  a  thing  alive,  as  what  makes  it  a  Self.  As  soon 
as  you  are  shut  off  from  the  rest  of  the  universe  into  a  Self, 
you  begin  to  be  alive. 

Violet  {indignant).  Oh,  surely — surely  that  cannot  be  so. 
Is  not  all  the  life  of  the  soul  in  communion,  not  separation  ? 

L.  There  can  be  no  communion  where  there  is  no  distinc- 
tion. But  we  shall  be  in  an  abyss  of  metaphysics  presently, 
if  we  don't  look  out ;  and  besides,  we  must  not  be  too  grand, 
to-day,  for  the  younger  children.  We'll  be  grand,  some  da}r, 
by  ourselves,  if  we  must.  [The  younger  children  are  not 
pleased,  and  prepare  to  remonstrate  ;  but,  knowing  by  expert 
ence,  that  all  conversations  in  which  the  word  'communion9 
occurs,  are  unintelligible,  think  better  of  it.)  Meantime,  for 
broad  answer  about  the  atoms.  I  do  not  think  we  should 
use  the  word  ■  life,'  of  any  energy  which  does  not  belong  to 
a  given  form.  A  seed,  or  an  egg,  or  a  young  animal  are  pro- 
perly called  '  alive '  with  respect  to  the  force  belonging  to 
those  forms,  which  consistently  develops  that  form,  and  no 
other.  But  the  force  which  crystallises  a  mineral  appears  to 
be  chiefly  external,  and  it  does  not  produce  an  entirely  deter- 
minate and  individual  form,  limited  in  size,  but  only  an  ag- 
gregation, in  which  some  limiting  laws  must  be  observed. 

Mary.  But  I  do  not  see  much  difference,  that  way,  between 
a  crystal  and  a  tree. 

L.  Add,  then,  that  the  mode  of  the  energy  in  a  living 
thing  implies  a  continual  change  in  its  elements ;  and  a 
period  for  its  end.  So  you  may  define  life  by  its  attached 
negative,  death  ;  and  still  more  by  its  attached  positive, 
birth.  But  I  won't  be  plagued  any  more  about  this,  just 
now ;  if  you  choose  to  think  the  crystals  alive,  do,  and  wel- 
come. Rocks  have  always  been  called  -  living  '  in  their  na« 
tive  place. 


THE  CRYSTAL  LIFE. 


31 


Mary.  These's  one  question  more  ;  then  I've  done. 
L.  Only  one  ? 
Mary.  Only  one. 

L.  But  if  it  is  answered,  won't  it  turn  into  two? 
Mary.  No  ;  I  think  it  will  remain  single,  and  be  comfort* 
.  able. 

L.  Let  me  hear  it. 

Mary.  You  know,  we  are  to  crystallise  ourselves  out  01 
the  whole  playground.  Now,  what  playground  have  the 
minerals  ?  Where  are  they  scattered  before  they  are  crystal- 
lised ;  and  where  are  the  crystals  generally  made  ? 

L.  That  sounds  to  me  more  like  three  questions  than  one, 
Mary.    If  it  is  only  one,  it  is  a  wide  one. 

Mary.  I  did  not  say  anything  about  the  width  of  it. 

L.  Well,  I  must  keep  it  within  the  best  compass  I  can. 
WThen  rocks  either  dry  from  a  moist  state,  or  cool  from  a 
heated  state,  they  necessarily  alter  in  bulk ;  and  cracks,  or 
open  spaces,  form  in  them  in  all  directions.  These  cracks 
must  be  filled  up  with  solid  matter,  or  the  rock  would  even- 
tually become  a  ruinous  heap.  So,  sometimes  by  water, 
sometimes  by  vapour,  sometimes  nobody  knows  how,  erystal- 
lisable  matter  is  brought  from  somewhere,  and  fastens  itself 
in  these  open  spaces,  so  as  to  bind  the  rock  together  again, 
with  crystal  cement.  A  vast  quantity  of  hollows  are  formed 
in  lavas  by  bubbles  of  gas,  just  as  the  holes  are  left  in  bread 
well  baked.  In  process  of  time  these  cavities  are  generally 
filled  with  various  crystals. 

Mary.  But  where  does  the  crystallising  substance  come  from  ? 

L.  Sometimes  out  of  the  rock  itself  ;  sometimes  from  below 
or  above,  through  the  veins.  The  entire  substance  of  the 
contracting  rock  may  be  filled  with  liquid,  pressed  into  it  so 
as  to  fill  every  pore  ; — or  with  mineral  vapour  ;— or  it  may 
be  so  charged  at  one  place,  and  empty  at  another.  There's 
no  end  to  the  '  may  be's.'  But  all  that  you  need  fancy,  for 
our  present  purpose,  is  that  hollows  in  the  rocks,  like  the 
caves  in  Derbyshire,  are  traversed  by  liquids  or  vapour  con- 
taining certain  elements  in  a  more  or  less  free  or  separate 
state,  which  crystallise  on  the  cave  walls. 


38 


THE  ETHICS  OF  THE  DUST. 


Sibyl.  There  now ; — Mary  has  had  all  her  questions  an« 

swered  :  it's  my  turn  to  have  mine. 

L.  Ah,  there's  a  conspiracy  among  you,  I  see.    I  might 

have  guessed  as  much. 

Dora.  I'm  sure  you  ash  us  questions  enough  !  How  can 
you  have  the  heart,  when  you  dislike  so  to  be  asked  them 
yourself  ? 

L.  My  dear  child,  if  people  do  not  answer  questions,  it 
does  not  matter  how  many  they  are  asked,  because  they've 
no  trouble  with  them.  Now,  when  I  ask  you  questions,  I 
never  expect  to  be  answered  ;  but  when  you  ask  me,  you 
always  do  ;  and  it's  not  fair. 

Dora.  Very  well,  we  shall  understand,  next  time. 

Sibyl.  No,  but  seriously,  we  all  want  to  ask  one  thing 
more,  quite  dreadfully. 

L.  And  I  don't  want  to  be  asked  it,  quite  dreadfully  ;  but 
you'll  have  your  own  way,  of  course. 

Sibyl.  We  none  of  us  understand  about  the  lower  Pthah. 
It  was  not  merely  yesterday ;  but  in  all  we  have  read  about 
him  in  Wilkinson,  or  in  any  book,  we  cannot  understand 
what  the  Egyptians  put  their  god  into  that  ugly  little  de- 
formed shape  for. 

L.  Well,  I'm  glad  it's  that  sort  of  question  ;  because  I  can 
answer  anything  I  like,  to  that. 

Egypt.  Anything  you  like  will  do  quite  wTell  for  us  ;  we 
shall  be  pleased  with  the  answer,  if  you  are. 

L.  I  am  not  so  sure  of  that,  most  gracious  queen ;  for  I 
must  begin  by  the  statement  that  queens  seem  to  have  dis- 
liked all  sorts  of  work,  in  those  days,  as  much  as  some  queens 
dislike  sewing  to-day. 

Egypt.  Now,  it's  too  bad  !  and  just  when  I  was  trying  to 
say  the  civillest  thing  I  could  ! 

L.  But,  Egypt,  why  did  you  tell  me  you  disliked  sewing 
so? 

Egypt.  Did  not  I  show  you  how  the  thread  cuts  my  fin- 
gers? and  I  always  get  cramp,  somehow,  in  my  neck,  if  I  sew 
long. 

L.  Well,  I  suppose  the  Egyptian  queens  thought  every 


THE  CRYSTAL  LIFE. 


39 


body  got  cramp  in  their  neck,  if  they  sewed  long  ;  and  that 
thread  always  cut  people's  fingers.  At  all  events,  every 
kind  of  manual  labour  was  despised  both  by  them,  and  the 
Greeks  ;  and,  while  they  owned  the  real  good  and  fruit  of  it, 
they  yet  held  it  a  degradation  to  all  who  practised  it.  Also, 
knowing  the  laws  of  life  thoroughly,  they  perceived  that  the 
special  practice  necessary  to  bring  any  manual  art  to  perfec- 
tion strengthened  the  body  distorteclly  ;  one  energy  or  mem* 
ber  gaining  at  the  expense  of  the  rest.  They  especially 
dreaded  and  despised  any  kind  of  work  that  had  to  be  done 
near  fire  :  jet,  feeling  what  they  owed  to  it  in  metal- work,  as 
the  basis  of  all  other  work,  they  expressed  this  mixed  rever- 
ence and  scorn  in  the  varied  types  of  the  lame  Hephaestus, 
and  the  lower  Pthah. 

Sibyl.  But  what  did  you  mean  by  making  him  say  '  every- 
thing great  I  can  make  small,  and  everything  small  great  ?  * 

L.  I  had  my  own  separate  meaning  in  that.  We  have  seen 
in  modern  times  the  power  of  the  lower  Pthah  developed  in 
a  separate  way,  which  no  Greek  nor  Egyptian  could  have 
conceived.  It  is  the  character  of  pure  and  eyeless  manual 
labour  to  conceive  everything  as  subjected  to  it :  and,  in 
reality,  to  disgrace  and  diminish  all  that  is  so  subjected  ;  ag- 
grandising itself,  and  the  thought  of  itself,  at  the  expense  of 
all  noble  things.  I  heard  an  orator,  and  a  good  one  too,  at 
the  Working  Men's  College,  the  other  day,  make  a  great 
point  in  a  description  of  our  railroads  ;  saying,  with  grandly 
conducted  emphasis,  '  They  have  made  man  greater,  and  the 
world  less.'  His  working  audience  were  mightily  pleased  ; 
they  thought  it  so  very  fine  a  thing  to  be  made  bigger  them- 
selves ;  and  all  the  rest  of  the  world  less.  I  should  have  en* 
joyed  asking  them  (but  it  would  have  been  a  pity — they 
were  so  pleased),  how  much  less  they  would  like  to  have  the 
world  made  ; — and  whether,  at  present,  those  of  them  really 
felt  the  biggest  men,  who  lived  in  the  least  houses. 

Sibyl.  But  then,  why  did  you  make  Pthah  say  that  he 
could  make  weak  things  strong,  and  small  things  great  ? 

L.  My  dear,  he  is  a  boaster  and  self-assertor,  by  nature  ; 
but  it  is  so  far  true.    For  instance,  we  used  to  have  a  fair 


THE  ETHICS  OF  THE  DU81. 


in  our  neighbourhood — a  very  fine  fair  we  thought  it.  You 
never  saw  such  an  one  ;  but  if  you  look  at  the  engraving  ol 
Turner's  '  St.  Catherine's  Hill,'  you  will  see  what  it  was  like. 
There  were  curious  booths,  carried  on  poles;  and  peep-shows  ; 
and  music,  with  plenty  of  drums  and  cymbals  ;  and  much 
barley-sugar  and  gingerbread,  and  the  like  :  and  in  the  alleys 
of  this  fair  the  London  populace  would  enjoy  themselves, 
after  their  fashion,  very  thoroughly.  Well,  the  little  Pthah 
get  to  work  upon  it  one  day ;  he  made  the  wooden  poles  into 
iron  ones,  and  put  them  across,  like  his  own  crooked  legs, 
so  that  you  always  fall  over  them  if  you  don't  look  where  you 
are  going  ;  and  he  turned  all  the  canvas  into  panes  of  glass, 
and  put  it  up  on  his  iron  cross-poles  ;  and  made  all  the  little 
booths  into  one  great  booth  ;  and  people  said  it  was  very 
fine,  and  a  new  style  of  architecture  ;  and  Mr.  Dickens  said 
nothing  was  ever  like  it  in  Fairy-land,  which  was  very  true. 
And  then  the  little  Pthah  set  to  work  to  put  fine  fairings  in 
it ;  and  he  painted  the  Nineveh  bulls  afresh,  with  the  blackest 
eyes  he  could  paint  (because  he  had  none  himself),  and  he 
got  the  angels  down  from  Lincoln  choir,  and  gilded  their 
wings  like  his  gingerbread  of  old  times  ;  and  he  sent  for 
everything  else  he  could  think  of,  and  put  it  in  his  booth. 
There  are  the  casts  of  Niobe  and  her  children  ;  and  the  Chim- 
panzee ;  and  the  wooden  Caffres  and  New-Zealanders ;  and 
the  Shakespeare  House;  and  Le  Grand  Blondin,  and  Le 
Petit  Blondin  ;  and  Handel ;  and  Mozart ;  and  no  end  of 
shops,  and  buns,  and  beer  ;  and  all  the  little -Pthah- worship- 
pers say,  never  was  anything  so  sublime  ! 

Sibyl.  Now,  do  you  mean  to  say  you  never  go  to  these 
Crystal  Palace  concerts  ?    They're  as  good  as  good  can  be. 

L.  I  don't  go  to  the  thundering  things  with  a  million  of 
bad  voices  in  them.  When  I  want  a  song,  I  get  Julia  Man- 
nering  and  Lucy  Bertram  and  Counsellor  Pleydell  to  sing 
'  We  be  three  poor  Mariners '  to  me  ;  then  I've  no  headache 
next  morning.  But  I  do  go  to  the  smaller  concerts,  when  ] 
can  ;  for  they  are  very  good,  as  you  say,  Sibyl :  and  I  always 
get  a  reserved  seat  somewhere  near  the  orchestra,  where  1 
am  sure  1  can  see  the  kettle-drummer  drum. 


THE  CRYSTAL  LIFE. 


41 


Sibyl.  Now  do  be  serious,  for  one  minute. 

L.  I  am  serious — never  was  more  so.  You  know  one  can*t 
see  the  modulation  of  violinists'  fingers,  but  one  can  see  the 
vibration  of  the  drummer's  hand  ;  and  it's  lovely. 

Sibyl.  But  fancy  going  to  a  concert,  not  to  hear,  but  to 
see  ! 

L.  Yes,  it  is  very  absurd.  The  quite  right  thing,  I  believe, 
is  to  go  there  to  talk.  I  confess,  however,  that  in  most 
music,  when  very  well  done,  the  doing  of  it  is  to  me  the 
chiefly  interesting  part  of  the  business.  I'm  always  thinking 
how  good  it  would  be  for  the  fat,  supercilious  people,  who 
care  so  little  for  their  half-crown's  worth,  to  be  set  to  try  and 
do  a  half-crown's  worth  of  anything  like  it. 

Mary.  But  surely  that  Crystal  Palace  is  a  great  good  and 
help  to  the  people  of  London  ? 

L.  The  fresh  air  of  the  Norwood  hills  is,  or  was,  my  dear  ; 
but  they  are  spoiling  that  with  smoke  as  fast  as  they  can. 
And  the  palace  (as  they  call  it)  is  a  better  place  for  them,  by 
much,  than  the  old  fair ;  and  it  is  always  there,  instead  of  for 
three  days  only  ;  and  it  shuts  up  at  proper  hours  of  night. 
And  good  use  may  be  made  of  the  things  in  it,  if  you  know 
how  :  but  as  for  its  teaching  the  people,  it  will  teach  them 
nothing  but  the  lowest  of  the  lower  Pthah's  work — nothing 
but  hammer  and  tongs.  I  saw  a  wonderful  piece,  of  his 
doing,  in  the  place,  only  the  other  day.  Some  unhappy 
metal-worker — I  am  not  sure  if  it  was  not  a  metal-working 
firm — had  taken  three  years  to  make  a  Golden  eagle. 

Sibyl.  Of  real  gold  ? 

L.  No  ;  of  bronze,  or  copper,  or  some  of  their  foul  patent 
metal— it  is  no  matter  what.  I  meant  a  model  of  our  chief 
British  eagle.  Every  feather  was  made  separately  ;  and 
every  filament  of  every  feather  separately,  and  so  joined  on  ; 
and  all  the  quills  modelled  of  the  right  length  and  right  sec- 
tion, and  at  last  the  whole  cluster  of  them  fastened  together 
You  know,  children,  I  don't  think  much  of  my  owrn  drawing  ; 
but  take  my  proud  word  for  once,  that  when  I  go  to  the 
Zoological  Gardens,  and  happen  to  have  a  bit  of  chalk  in  my 
pocket,  and  the  Gray  Harpy  will  sit,  without  screwing  his 


THE  ETHICS  OF  THE  BUST. 


head  rcranc!,  for  thirty  seconds, — I  can  do  a  better  thing  of 
him  in  that  time  than  the  three  years'  work  of  this  industri- 
ous firm.  For,  during  the  thirty  seconds,  the  eagle  is  my 
object, — not  myself  ;  and  during  the  three  years,  the  firm's 
object;,  in  every  fibre  of  bronze  it  made,  was  itself,  and  not 
the  eagle.  That  is  the  true  meaning  of  the  little  Pthah's 
having  no  eyes — he  can  see  only  himself.  The  Egyptian 
beetle  was  not  quite  the  full  type  of  him  ;  our  northern 
ground  beetle  is  a  truer  one.  It  is  beautiful  to  see  it  at  work, 
gathering  its  treasures  (such  as  they  are)  into  little  round 
balls  ;  and  pushing  them  home  with  the  strong  wrong  end  of 
it, — head  downmost  all  the  way, — like  a  modern  political 
economist  with  his  ball  of  capital,  declaring  that  a  nation  can 
stand  on  its  vices  better  than  on  its  virtues.  But  away  with 
you,  children,  now,  for  I'm  getting  cross. 

Dora.  I'm  going  down-stairs  ;  I  shall  take  care,  at  any 
rate,  that  there  are  no  little  Pthahs  in  the  kitchen  cupboards, 


LECTURE  IV. 


THE  CRYSTAL  ORDERS. 

A  working  Lecture,  in  the  large  Sclwol-room  ;  icith  experimental  Interludes, 
The  great  bell  has  rung  unexpectedly. 

Kathleen  {entering  disconsolate,  though  first  at  the  summons). 
Oh  dear,  oh  dear,  what  a  day  !  Was  ever  anything  so  provok- 
lDg !  just  when  we  wanted  to  crystallise  ourselves  ; — and  I'm 
sure  it's  going  to  rain  all  day  long. 

L.  So  am  I,  Kate.  The  sky  has  quite  an  Irish  way  with  it, 
But  I  don't  see  why  Irish  girls  should  also  look  so  dismal. 
Fancy  that  you  don't  want  to  crystallise  yourselves :  you 
didn't,  the  day  before  yesterday,  and  you  were  not  unhappy 
when  it  rained  then. 

Florrie.  Ah !  but  we  do  want  to-day ;  and  the  rain's  so 
tiresome. 

L.  That  is  to  say,  children,  that  because  you  are  all  the 
richer  by  the  expectation  of  playing  at  a  new  game,  you  choose 
to  make  yourselves  unhappier  than  when  you  had  nothing  to 
look  forward  to,  but  the  old  ones. 

Isabel.  But  then,  to  have  to  wait — wait — wait ;  and  before 
we've  tried  it ; — and  perhaps  it  will  rain  to-morrow,  too  ! 

L.  It  may  also  rain  the  day  after  to-morrow.  We  can  make 
ourselves  uncomfortable  to  any  extent  with  perhapses,  Isabel. 
You  may  stick  perhapses  into  your  little  minds,  like  pins,  till 
you  are  as  uncomfortable  as  the  Lilliputians  made  Gulliver 
with  their  arrows,  when  he  would  not  lie  quiet. 

Isabel.  But  what  are  we  to  do  to-day  ? 

L.  To  be  quiet,  for  one  thing,  like  Gulliver  when  he  saw 
there  was  nothing  better  to  be  done.  And  to  practise  patience, 
I  can  tell  you  children,  that  requires  nearly  as  much  practising 
as  music  ;  and  we  are  continually  losing  our  lessons  when  the 
master  comes.  Now,  to-day,  here's  a  nice  little  adagio  lesson 
for  us?  if  we  play  it  properly. 


THE  ETHICS  OF  THE  DUST. 


Isabel.  But  I  don't  like  that  sort  of  lesson.  I  can't  play  it 
properly. 

L.  Can  you  play  a  Mozart  sonata  yet,  Isabel  ?  The  more 
need  to  practise.  All  one's  life  is  a  music,  if  one  touches  the 
notes  rightly,  and  in  time.    But  there  must  be  no  hurry. 

Kathleen.  I'm  sure  there's  no  music  in  stopping  in  on  a 
rainy  day. 

L.  There's  no  music  in  a  '  rest,'  Katie,  that  I  know  of  :  but 
there's  the  making  of  music  in  it.  And  people  are  always 
missing  that  part  of  the  life-melody ;  and  scrambling  on  with- 
out counting — not  that  it's  easy  to  count ;  but  nothing  on 
which  so  much  depends  ever  is  easy.  People  are  always  talk- 
ing of  perseverance,  and  courage,  and  fortitude  ;  but  patience 
is  the  finest  and  worthiest  part  of  fortitude, — and  the  rarest, 
too.  I  know  twenty  persevering  girls  for  one  patient  one  : 
but  it  is  only  that  twenty-first  who  can  do  her  work,  out  and 
out,  or  enjoy  it.  For  patience  lies  at  the  root  of  all  pleasures, 
as  well  as  of  all  powers.  Hope  herself  ceases  to  be  happiness, 
when  Impatience  companions  her. 

(Isabel  and  Lilys^  down  on  the  floor,  arid  fold  their  hands* 
The  others  follow  their  example.) 

Good  children  !  but  that's  not  quite  the  way  of  it,  neither. 
Folded  hands  are  not  necessarily  resigned  ones.  The  Pa- 
tience who  really  smiles  at  grief  usually  stands,  or  walks,  or 
even  runs  :  she  seldom  sits  ;  though  she  may  sometimes  have 
to  do  it,  for  many  a  day,  poor  thing,  by  monuments ;  or  like 
Chaucer's,  'with  face'  pale,  upon  a  hill  of  sand.'  But  we  are 
not  reduced  to  that  to-day.  Suppose  we  use  this  calamitous 
forenoon  to  choose  the  shapes  we  are  to  crystallise  into  ?  we 
know  nothing  about  them  yet, 

(The  pictures  of  resignation  rise  from  the  floor,  not  in  the 
patientest  manner.    General  applause.) 

Mary  (with  one  or  two  others).  The  very  thing  we  wanted 
to  ask  you  about ! 

Lily.  We  looked  at  the  books  about  crystals,  but  they  are 
so  dreadful. 


THE  CRYSTAL  ORDERS. 


45 


L.  Well,  Lily,  we  must  go  through  a  little  dreadfulness, 
that's  a  fact :  no  road  to  any  good  knowledge  is  wholly 
among  the  lilies  and  the  grass  ;  there  is  rough  climbing  to  be 
done  always.  But  the  crystal-books  are  a  little  too  dreadful, 
most  of  them,  I  admit ;  and  wTe  shall  have  to  be  content  with 
very  little  of  their  help.  You  know,  as  you  cannot  stand  on 
each  other's  heads,  you  can  only  make  yourselves  into  the 
sections  of  crystals, — the  figures  they  show  when  they  are 
cut  through  ;  and  we  will  choose  some  that  will  be  quite  easy. 
You  shall  make  diamonds  of  yourselves  

Isabel.  Oh,  no,  no  !  we  won't  be  diamonds,  please. 

L.  Yes,  you  shall,  Isabel ;  they  are  very  pretty  things,  if 
the  jewellers,  and  the  kings  and  queens,  wrould  only  let  them 
alone.  You  shall  make  diamonds  of  yourselves,  and  rubies  of 
yourselves,  and  emeralds  ;  and  Irish  diamonds  ;  two  of  those 
— with  Lily  in  the  middle  of  one,  which  will  be  very  orderly, 
of  course  ;  and  Kathleen  in  the  middle  of  the  other,  for  which 
we  will  hope  the  best ; — and  you  shall  make  Derbyshire  sj3ar 
of  yourselves,  and  Iceland  spar,  and  gold,  and  silver,  and — 
Quicksilver  there's  enough  of  in  you,  without  any  making. 

Mary.  Now,  you  know,  the  children  will  be  getting  quite 
wild :  we  must  really  get  pencils  and  paper,  and  begin  properly. 

L.  Wait  a  minute,  Miss  Mary  ;  I  think  as  we've  the  school 
room  clear  to-day,  I'll  try  to  give  you  some  notion  of  the 
three  great  orders  or  ranks  of  crystals,  into  which  all  the 
others  seem  more  or  less  to  fall.  We  shall  only  want  one 
figure  a  day,  in  the  playground  ;  and  that  can  be  drawn  in  a 
minute  :  but  the  general  ideas  had  better  be  fastened  first.  I 
must  show  you  a  great  many  minerals ;  so  let  me  have  three 
tables  wheeled  into  the  three  windows,  that  we  may  keep  our 
specimens  separate  ; — we  will  keep  the  three  orders  of  crys- 
tals on  separate  tables. 

(First  Interlude,  of  pushing  and  pulling,  and  spreading  of 
baize  covers.  Violet,  not  particularly  minding  what  she  is 
about,  gets  herself  jammed  into  a  corner,  and  bid  to  stand 
out  of  the  way ;  on  which  she  devotes  herself  to  medi* 
tation.) 


46 


THE  ETHICS  OF  THE  DUST. 


Violet  (after  interval  of  meditation).  How  strange  it  is  that 
everything  seems  to  divide  into  threes  ! 

L.  Everything  doesn't  divide  into  threes.  Ivy  won't,  though 
shamrock  will ;  and  daisies  won't,  though  lilies  will. 

Violet.  But  all  the  nicest  things  seem  to  divide  into  threes, 

L.  Violets  won't. 

Violet.  No  ;  I  should  think  not,  indeed !  But  I  mean  the 
great  things. 

L.  I've  always  heard  the  globe  had  four  quarters. 

Isabel.  Well ;  but  you  know  you  said  it  hadn't  any  quarters 
at  all.    So  mayn't  it  really  be  divided  into  three  ? 

L.  If  it  were  divided  into  no  more  than  three,  on  the  out- 
side of  it,  Isabel,  it  would  be  a  fine  world  to  live  in  ;  and  if 
it  were  divided  into  three  in  the  inside  of  it,  it  would  soon  be 
no  world  to  live  in  at  all. 

Dora.  We  shall  never  get  to  the  crystals,  at  this  rate. 
(Aside  to  Mary.  )  He  will  get  off  into  political  economy  be- 
fore we  know  where  we  are.  (Aloud.)  But  the  crystals  are 
divided  into  three,  then  ? 

L.  No  ;  but  there  are  three  general  notions  by  which  we 
may  best  get  hold  of  them.  Then  between  these  notions  there 
are  other  notions. 

Lily  (alarmed).  A  great  many?  And  shall  we  have  to 
learn  them  all  ? 

L.  More  than  a  great  many — a  quite  infinite  many.  So 
you  cannot  learn  them  ail. 

Lily  (greatly  relieved).    Then  may  we  only  learn  the  three? 

L.  Certainly  ;  unless,  when  you  have  got  those  three  no- 
tions, you  want  to  have  some  more  notions  ; — which  would 
not  surprise  me.  But  we'll  try  for  the  three,  first.  Katie, 
you  broke  your  coral  necklace  this  morning  ? 

Kathleen.  Oh  !  who  told  you  ?  It  was  in  jumping.  Tm 
so  sorry ! 

L.  I'm  very  glad.    Can  you  fetch  me  the  beads  of  it  ? 

Kathleen.  I've  lost  some  ;  here  are  the  rest  in  my  pocket, 
if  I  can  only  get  them  out. 

L.  You  mean  to  get  them  out  some  day,  I  suppose  ;  so  try 
now.    I  want  them. 


THE  CRYSTAL  ORDERS. 


49 


(Kathleen  empties  her  pocket  on  the  floor.  The  beads  dis 
perse.  Tlie  School  disperses  also.  Second  Interlude — 
hunting  piece.) 

L.  (after  waiting  patiently  for  a  quarter  of  an  hoar,  to  Isabel, 
who  comes  up  from  under  the  table  with  her  hair  all  about  het 
ears,  and  the  last  findable  beads  in  her  hand).  Mice  are  useful 
little  things  sometimes.  Now,  mousie,  I  want  all  those  beads 
crystallised.  How  many  ways  are  there  of  putting  them  in 
order  ? 

Isabel.  Well,  first  one  would  string  them,  I  suppose  ? 

L.  Yes,  that's  the  first  way.  You  cannot  string  ultimate 
atoms  ;  but  you  can  put  them  in  a  row,  and  then  they  fasten 
themselves  together,  somehow,  into  a  long  rod  or  needle.  We 
will  call  these  '  jVee^/e-crystals.'    What  would  be  the  next  way  J 

Isabel.  I  suppose,  as  we  are  to  get  together  in  the  play- 
ground, when  it  stops  raining,  in  different  shapes  ? 

L.  Yes  ;  put  the  beads  together,  then,  in  the  simplest  form 
you  can,  to  begin  with.  Put  them  into  a  square,  and  pad 
them  close. 

Isabel  (after  careful  endeavour).    I  can't  get  them  closer. 

L.  That  will  do.  Now  you  may  see,  beforehand,  that  if  you 
try  to  throw  yourselves  into  square  in  this  confused  way, 
you  will  never  know  your  places  ;  so  you  had  better  consider 
every  square  as  made  of  rods,  put  side  by  side.  Take  fout 
beads  of  equal  size,  first,  Isabel  ;  put  them  into  a  little  square. 
That,  you  may  consider  as  made  up  of  two  rods  of  two  beads 
each.  Then  you  can  make  a  square  a  size  larger,  out  of  three 
rods  of  thre«.  Then  the  next  square  may  be  a  size  larger. 
How  many  rods,  Lily  ? 

Lily.  Four  rods  of  four  beads  each,  I  suppose. 

L.  Yes,  and  then  five  rods  of  five,  and  so  on.  But  now, 
look  here  ;  make  another  square  of  four  beads  again.  You  see 
they  leave  a  little  opening  in  the  centre. 

Isabel  (pushing  two  opposite  ones  closer  together).  Now  they 
don't. 

L.  No  ;  but  now  it  isn't  a  square  ;  and  by  pushing  the  two 
together  you  have  pushed  the  two  others  farther  apart 


48 


THE  ETHICS  OF  THE  DUST. 


Isabel.  And  yet,  somehow,  they  all  seem  closer  than  they 
were ! 

L.  Yes  ;  for  before,  each  of  them  only  touched  two  of  the 
others,  but  now  each  of  the  two  in  the  middle  touches  the 
other  three.  Take  away  one  of  the  outsiders,  Isabel ;  now  you 
have  three  in  a  triangle — the  smallest  triangle  you  can  make 
out  of  the  beads.  Now  put  a  rod  of  three  beads  on  at  one 
side.  So,  you  have  a  triangle  of  six  beads  ;  but  just  the  shape 
of  the  first  one.  Next  a  rod  of  four  on  the  side  of  that ;  and 
you  have  a  triangle  of  ten  beads  :  then  a  rod  of  five  on  the 
side  of  that ;  and  you  have  a  triangle  of  fifteen.  Thus  you 
have  a  square  with  five  beads  on  the  side,  and  a  triangle  with 
five  beads  on  the  side  ;  equal-sided,  therefore,  like  the  square. 
So,  however  few  or  many  you  may  be,  you  may  soon  learn 
how  to  crystallise  quickly  into  these  two  figures,  which  are 
the  foundation  of  form  in  the  commonest,  and  therefore  act- 
ually the  most  important,  as  well  as  in  the  rarest,  and  there- 
fore, by  our  esteem,  the  most  important,  minerals  of  the 
world.    Look  at  this  in  my  hand. 

Violet.  Why,  it  is  leaf-gold  ! 

L.  Yes  ;  but  beaten  by  no  man's  hammer  ;  or  rather,  not 
beaten  at  all,  but  woven.  Besides,  feel  the  weight  of  it 
There  is  gold  enough  there  to  gild  the  walls  and  ceiling,  if  it 
were  beaten  thin. 

Violet.  How  beautiful !  And  it  glitters  like  a  leaf  covered 
with  frost. 

L.  You  only  think  it  so  beautiful  because  you  know  it  is 
gold.  It  is  not  prettier,  in  reality,  than  a  bit  of  brass  :  for  it 
is  Transylvanian  gold  ;  and  they  say  there  is  a  foolish  gnome 
in  the  mines  there,  who  is  always  wanting  to  live  in  the  moon, 
and  so  alloys  all  the  gold  with  a  little  silver.  I  don't  know 
how  that  may  be  :  but  the  silver  always  is  in  the  gold  ;  and  if 
he  does  it,  it's  very  provoking  of  him,  for  no  gold  is  woven  so 
fine  anywhere  else. 

Mary  (ivho  has  been  looking  through  her  magnifying  glass). 
But  this  is  not  woven.    This  is  all  made  of  little  triangles. 

L.  Say  'patched,'  then,  if  you  must  be  so  particular.  But 
\£  you  fancy  all  those  triangles,  small  as  they  are  (and  many 


TEE  CRYSTAL  ORDERS. 


49 


ei  them  are  infinitely  small),  made  up  again  of  rods,  and  those 
of  grains,  as  we  built  our  great  triangle  of  the  beads,  what 
word  will  you  take  for  the  manufacture  ? 

May.  There's  no  word — it  is  beyond  words. 

L.  Yes  ;  and  that  would  matter  little,  were  it  not  beyond 
thoughts  too.  But,  at  all  events,  this  yellow  leaf  of  dead  gold, 
$hed,  not  from  the  ruined  woodlands,  but  the  ruined  rocks, 
will  help  you  to  remember  the  second  kind  of  crystals,  Leaf- 
crystals,  or  Foliated  crystals  ;  though  I  show  you  the  form  in 
gold  first  only  to  make  a  strong  impression  on  you,  for  gold 
is  not  generally,  or  characteristically,  crystallised  in  leaves ; 
the  real  type  of  foliated  crystals  is  this  thing,  Mica  ;  which  if 
you  once  feel  well,  and  break  well,  you  will  always  know  again  ; 
and  you  will  often  have  occasion  to  know  it,  for  you  will  find  it 
everywhere,  nearly,  in  hill  countries. 

Kathleen.  If  we  break  it  well !    May  we  break  it  ? 

L.  To  powder,  if  you  like. 

(Surrenders  plate  of  brown  mica  to  public  investigation. 
Third  Interlude.  It  sustains  severely  philosophical  treat* 
ment  at  all  hands. ) 

Florrie.  (to  whom  the  last  fragments  have  descended)  Always 
leaves,  and  leaves,  and  nothing  but  leaves,  or  white  dust  I 

L.  That  dust  itself  is  nothing  but  finer  leaves. 

(Shows  them  to  Florrie  through  magnifying  glass.) 

Isabel  (peeping  over  Florrie's  shoulder).  But  then  this  bit 
Under  the  glass  looks  like  that  bit  out  of  the  glass !  If  we 
could  break  this  bit  under  the  glass,  what  would  it  be  like  ? 

L.  It  would  be  all  leaves  still. 

Isabel.  And  then  if  we  broke  those  again  ? 

L.  All  less  leaves  still. 

Isabel  (impatient).  And  if  we  broke  them  again,  and  again, 
and  again,  and  again,  and  again  ? 

L.  Well,  I  suppose  you  would  come  to  a  limit,  if  you  could 
only  see  it.  Notice  thai  the  little  flakes  already  differ  some- 
what from  the  large  ones  :  because  I  can  bend  them  up  and 
down,  and  they  stay  bent  ;  while  the  large  flake,  though  it 
bent  easily  a  little  way,  sprang  back  when  you  let  it  go,  and 


50 


THE  ETHICS  OF  THE  DUST, 


broke,  when  you  tried  to  bend  it  far.  And  a  large  mass  would 
not  bend  at  all. 

Mary.  Would  that  leaf  gold  separate  into  finer  leaves,  in 

the  same  way  ? 

L.  No  ;  and  therefore,  as  I  told  you,  it  is  not  a  characteris- 
tic specimen  of  a  foliated  crystallisation.  The  little  triangles 
are  portions  of  solid  crystals,  and  so  they  are  in  this,  which 
looks  like  a  black  mica  ;  but  you  see  it  is  made  up  of  triangles 
like  the  gold,  and  stands,  almost  accurately,  as  an  intermedi- 
ate link,  in  crystals,  between  mica  and  gold.  Yet  this  is  the 
commonest,  as  gold  the  rarest,  of  metals. 

Mary.  Is  it  iron  ?    I  never  saw  iron  so  bright. 

L.  It  is  rust  of  iron,  finely  crystallised :  from  its  resem- 
blance to  mica,  it  is  often  called  micaceous  iron. 

Kathleen.  May  we  break  this,  too  ? 

L.  No,  for  I  could  not  easily  get  such  another  crystal ; 
besides,  it  would  not  break  like  the  mica  ;  it  is  much  harder. 
But  take  the  glass  again,  and  look  at  the  fineness  of  the  jag- 
ged edges  of  the  triangles  where  they  lap  over  each  other. 
The  gold  has  the  same  :  but  you  see  them  better  here,  terrace 
above  terrace,  countless,  and  in  successive  angles,  like  superb 
fortified  bastions. 

May.  But  all  foliated  crystals  are  not  made  of  triangles  ? 

L.  Far  from  it ;  mica  is  occasionally  so,  but  usually  of 
hexagons  ;  aud  here  is  a  foliated  crystal  made  of  squares,  which 
will  show  you  that  the  leaves  of  the  rock-land  have  their  sum- 
mer green,  as  well  as  their  autumnal  gold. 

Florrie.  Oh  !  oh  !  oh  !  (jumps  for  joy). 

L.  Did  you  never  see  a  bit  of  green  leaf  before,  Florrie  ? 

Florrie.  Yes,  but  never  so  bright  as  that,  and  not  in  a 
sk>ne. 

L.  If  you  will  look  at  the  leaves  of  the  trees  in  sunshine 
after  a  shower,  you  will  find  they  are  much  brighter  than 
that ;  and  surely  they  are  none  the  worse  for  being  on  stalks 
instead  of  in  stones  ? 

Florrie.  Yes,  but  then  there  are  so  many  of  them,  one 
never  looks,  I  suppose. 

L.  Now  you  have  it,  Florrie. 


THE  CRYSTAL  ORDERS. 


51 


Violet  (sighing).  There  are  so  many  beautiful  things  we 
never  see ! 

L.  You  need  not  sigh  for  that,  Violet ;  but  I  will  tell  you 
what  we  should  all  sigh  for, — that  there  are  so  many  ugly 
things  we  never  see. 

Violet.  But  we  don't  want  to  see  ugly  things ! 

L.  You  had  better  say,  '  We  don't  want  to  suffer  thenio* 
You  ought  to  be  glad  in  thinking  how  much  more  beauty  God 
has  made,  than  human  eyes  can  ever  see  ;  but  not  glad  in 
thinking  how  much  more  evil  man  has  made,  than  his  own 
soul  can  ever  conceive,  much  more  than  his  hands  can  ever 
heal. 

Violet.  I  don't  understand  ; — how  is  that  like  the  leaves  ? 

L.  The  same  law  holds  in  our  neglect  of  multiplied  pain,  as 
in  our  neglect  of  multiplied  beauty.  Florrie  jumps  for  joy  at 
sight  of  half  an  inch  of  a  green  leaf  in  a  bi'own  stone  ;  and 
takes  more  notice  of  it  than  of  all  the  green  in  the  wood  :  and 
you,  or  I,  or  any  of  us,  would  be  unhappy  if  any  single  human 
creature  beside  us  were  in  sharp  pain  ;  but  we  can  read,  at 
breakfast,  day  after  day,  of  men  being  killed,  and  of  women 
and  children  dying  of  hunger,  faster  than  the  leaves  strew  the 
brooks  in  Vallombrosa  ;— and  then  go  out  to  play  croquet,  as 
if  nothing  had  happened. 

May.  But  we  do  not  see  the  people  being  killed  or  dying. 

L.  You  did  not  see  your  brother,  when  you  got  the  tele- 
gram the  other  day,  saying  he  was  ill,  May  ;  but  you  cried  for 
him  ;  and  played  no  croquet.  But  we  cannot  talk  of  these 
things  now ;  and  what  is  more,  you  must  let  me  talk  straight 
on,  for  a  little  while  ;  and  ask  no  questions  till  I've  done  :  for 
we  branch  ('  exfoliate,'  I  should  say,  mineralogically)  always 
into  something  else, — though  that's  my  fault  more  than  yours  ; 
but  I  must  go  straight  on  now.  You  have  got  a  distinct 
notion,  I  hope,  of  leaf-crystals  ;  and  you  see  the  sort  of  look 
they  have  :  you  can  easily  remember  that  '  folium '  is  Latin 
for  a  leaf,  and  that  the  separate  flakes  of  mica,  or  any  other 
such  stones,  are  called  c  folia  ; '  but,  because  mica  is  the  most 
characteristic  of  these  stones,  other  things  that  are  like  it  in 
structure  are  called  '  micas  ; '  thus  we  have  Uran-mica,  which 


52 


THE  ETHICS  OF  THE  BUST. 


is  the  green  leaf  I  showed  you  ;  aud  Copper-mica,  which  is 
another  like  it,  made  chiefly  of  copper ;  and  this  foliated  iron 
is  called  '  micaceous  iron/  You  have  then  these  two  great 
orders,  Needle-crystals,  made  (probably)  of  grains  in  rows  ; 
and  Leaf-crystals,  made  (probably)  of  needles  interwoven  ; 
now,  lastly,  there  are  crystals  of  a  third  order,  in  heaps,  or 
knots,  or  masses,  which  may  be  made,  either  of  leaves  laid 
one  upon  another,  or  of  needles  bound  like  Roman  fasces  ;  and 
mica  itself,  when  it  is  well  crystallised,  puts  itself  into  such 
masses,  as  if  to  show  us  how  others  are  made.  Here  is  a 
brown  six-sided  crystal,  quite  as  beautifully  chiselled  at  the 
sides  as  any  castle  tower  ;  but  you  see  it  is  entirely  built  of 
folia  of  mica,  one  laid  above  another,  which  break  away  the 
moment  I  touch  the  edge  with  my  knife.  Now,  here  is  an- 
other hexagonal  tower,  of  just  the  same  size  and  colour,  wThich 
I  want  you  to  compare  with  the  mica  carefully  ;  but  as  I  can- 
not wait  for  you  to  do  it  just  now,  I  must  tell  you  quickly 
what  main  differences  to  look  for.  First,  you  will  feel  it  is  far 
heavier  than  the  mica.  Then,  though  its  surface  looks  quite 
micaceous  in  the  folia  of  it,  when  you  try  them  with  the  knife, 

you  will  find  you  cannot  break  them  away  

Kathleen.  May  I  try  ? 

L.  Yes,  you  mistrusting  Katie.  Here's  my  strong  knife 
for  you.  [Experimental  pause.  Kathleen  doing  her  best.) 
You'll  have  that  knife  shutting  on  your  finger  presently,  Kate  ; 
and  I  don't  know  a  girl  who  would  like  less  to  have  her  hand 
tied  up  for  a  week. 

Kathleen  (ivJio  also  does  not  like  to  be  beaten — giving  up  the 
knife  despondently).    What  can  the  nasty  hard  thing  be? 

L.  It  is  nothing  but  indurated  clay,  Kate  :  very  hard  set 
certainly,  yet  not  so  hard  as  it  might  be.  If  it  were  thor- 
oughly well  crystallised,  you  would  see  none  of  those  mica- 
ceous fractures  ;  and  the  stone  would  be  quite  red  and  clear, 
all  through. 

Kathleen.    Oh,  cannot  you  show  us  one  ? 

L.  Egypt  can,  if  you  ask  her  ;  she  has  a  beautiful  one  in  th$ 
clasp  of  her  favourite  bracelet. 

Kathleen.  Why,  that's  a  ruby  ! 


THE  CRYSTAL  ORDERS. 


53 


L.  Well,  so  is  that  thing  you've  been  scratching  at. 
Kathleen.  My  goodness ! 

{Takes  up  the  stone  again,  very  delicately ;  and  drops  it 
General  consternation.) 

L.  Never  mind,  Katie  ;  you  might  drop  it  from  the  top  of 
the  house,  and  do  it  no  harm.  But  though  you  really  are 
a  very  good  girl,  and  as  good-natured  as  anybody  can  possi- 
bly be,  remember,  you  have  your  faults,  like  other  people  ; 
and,  if  I  were  you,  the  next  time  I  wanted  to  assert  anything 
energetically,  I  would  assert  it  by  c  my  badness,'  not  \  my  good- 
ness.' 

Kathleen.  Ah,  now,  it's  too  bad  of  you  ! 

L.  Well,  then,  I'll  invoke,  on  occasion,  my  '  too-badness/ 
But  you  may  as  well  pick  up  the  ruby,  now  you  have  dropped 
it ;  and  look  carefully  at  the  beautiful  hexagonal  lines  which 
gleam  on  its  surface  ;  and  here  is  a  pretty  white  sapphire  (essen- 
tially the  same  stone  as  the  ruby),  in  which  you  will  see  the 
same  lovely  structure,  like  the  threads  of  the  finest  white 
cobweb.  I  do  not  know  what  is  the  exact  method  of  a  ruby's 
construction  ;  but  you  see  by  these  lines,  what  fine  construction 
there  is,  even  in  this  hardest  of  stones  (after  the  diamond), 
which  usually  appears  as  a  massive  lump  or  knot.  There  is 
therefore  no  real  mineralogical  distinction  between  needle 
crystals  and  knotted  crystals,  but,  practically,  crystallised 
masses  throw  themselves  into  one  of  the  three  groups  we 
have  been  examining  to-day  ;  and  appear  either  as  Needles, 
as  Folia,  or  as  Knots  ;  when  they  are  in  needles  (or  fibres), 
they  make  the  stones  or  rocks  formed  out  of  them  'fibrous  ; 9 
when  they  are  in  folia,  they  make  them  'foliated  ; '  when  they 
are  in  knots  (or  grains),  '  granular.'  Fibrous  rocks  are  com- 
paratively rare,  in  mass  ;  but  fibrous  minerals  are  innumer- 
able ;  and  it  is  often  a  question  which  really  no  one  but  a 
young  lady  could  possibly  settle,  whether  one  should  call  the 
fibres  composing  them  4  threads  '  or  4  needles.'  Here  is  amian- 
thus, for  instance,  which  is  quite  as  fine  and  soft  as  any  cotton 
thread  you  ever  sewed  with  ;  and  here  is  sulphide  of  bismuth, 
with  sharper  points  and  brighter  lustre  than  your  finest 


THE  ETHICS  OF  THE  DUST. 

needles  have  ;  and  fastened  in  white  webs  of  quartz  more 
delicate  than  your  finest  lace  ;  and  here  is  sulphide  of  anti- 
mony, which  looks  like  mere  purple  wool,  but  it  is  all  of 
purple  needle  crystals  ;  and  here  is  red  oxide  of  copper  (you 
must  not  breathe  on  it  as  you  look,  or  you  may  blow  some  of 
the  films  of  it  off  the  stone),  which  is  simply  a  wToven  tissue 
of  scarlet  silk.  However,  these  finer  thread  forms  are  compar- 
atively rare,  while  the  bolder  and  needle-like  crystals  occur 
constantly  ;  so  that,  I  believe,  i  Needle-crystal  •  is  the  best 
word  (the  grand  one  is  '  Acicular  crystal,'  but  Sibyl  will  tell 
you  it  is  all  the  same,  only  less  easily  understood  ;  and  there- 
fore more  scientific).  Then  the  Leaf- crystals,  as  I  said, 
form  an  immense  mass  of  foliated  rocks ;  and  the  Granular 
crystals,  which  are  of  many  kinds,  form  essentially  granular, 
or  granitic  and  porphyritic  rocks  ;  and  it  is  always  a  point  of 
more  interest  to  me  (and  I  think  will  ultimately  be  to  you), 
to  consider  the  causes  which  force  a  given  mineral  to  take 
any  one  of  these  three  general  forms,  than  what  the  peculiar 
geometrical  limitations  are,  belonging  to  its  own  crystals.* 
It  is  more  interesting  to  me,  for  instance,  to  try  and  find  out 
%vhy  the  red  oxide  of  copper,  usually  crystallising  in  cubes  or 
octahedrons,  makes  itself  exquisitely,  out  of  its  cubes,  into 
this  red  silk  in  one  particular  Cornish  mine,  than  what  are 
the  absolutely  necessary  angles  of  the  octahedron,  w7hich  is 
its  common  form.  At  all  events,  that  mathematical  part  of 
crystallography  is  quite  beyond  girls'  strength ;  but  these 
questions  of  the  various  tempers  and  manners  of  crystals  are 
not  only  comprehensible  by  you,  but  full  of  the  most  curious 
teaching  for  you.  For  in  the  fulfilment,  to  the  best  of  their 
power,  of  their  adopted  form  under  given  circumstances^ 
there  are  conditions  entirely  resembling  those  of  human  vir- 
tue ;  and  indeed  expressible  under  no  term  so  proper  as  that 
of  the  Virtue,  or  Courage  of  crystals  : — which,  if  you  are  not 
afraid  of  the  crystals  making  you  ashamed  of  yourselves,  we 
will  try  to  get  some  notion  of,  to-morrow.  But  it  will  be  a 
bye-lecture,  and  more  about  yourselves  than  the  minerals. 
Don't  come  unless  you  like. 

*  Note  iv. 


THE  CRYSTAL  ORDERS. 


55 


Maky.  I'm  sure  the  crystals  will  make  us  ashamed  of  our- 
selves ;  but  we'll  come,  for  all  that. 

L.  Meantime,  look  well  and  quietly  over  these  needle,  or 
thread  crystals,  and  those  on  the  other  two  tables,  with  mag- 
nifying glasses,  and  see  what  thoughts  will  come  into  your 
little  heads  about  them.  For  the  best  thoughts  are  generally 
those  which  come  without  being  forced,  one  does  not  know 
how.  And  so  I  hope  you  will  get  through  your  wet  dav  pa- 
tiently. 


LECTUEE  V. 


CRYSTAL  VIRTUES. 

A  quiet  talk,  hi  the  afternoon,  by  the  sunniest  icindow  of  tlie  Drawing* 
room.  Present,  Florrie,  Isabel,  May,  Lucilla,  Kathleen,  Doha, 
Mary,  and  some  others,  who  have  saved  time  for  the  bye-Lecture. 

L.  So  you  have  really  come,  like  good  girls,  to  be  made 
ashamed  of  yourselves  ? 

Dora  (very  meekly).  No,  we  needn't  be  made  so  ;  we  always 
are. 

L.  "Well,  I  believe  that's  truer  than  most  pretty  speeches  : 
but  you  know,  you  saucy  girl,  some  people  have  more  reason 
to  be  so  than  others.  Are  you  sure  everybody  is,  as  well  as 
you  ? 

The  General  Voice.    Yes,  yes  ;  everybody. 
L.  What !  Florrie  ashamed  of  herself  ? 

(Florrie  hides  behind  the  curtain.) 
L.  And  Isabel  ? 

(Isabel  hides  under  the  table.) 
L.  And  May? 

(May  runs  into  the  corner  behind  the  piano.) 
L.  And  Lucilla  ? 

(Lucilla  hides  her  face  in  her  hands.) 
L.  Dear,  dear  ;  but  this  will  never  do.    I  shall  have  to  tell 
you  of  the  faults  of  the  crystals,  instead  of  virtues,  to  put  you 
in  heart  again. 

May  (coming  out  of  her  corner).  Oh  !  have  the  crystals  faults, 
like  us  ? 

L.  Certainly,  May.  Their  best  virtues  are  shown  in  fight- 
ing their  faults.  And  some  have  a  great  many  faults ;  and 
some  are  very  naughty  crystals  indeed. 

Florrie  (from  behind  her  curtain).    As  naughty  as  me? 

Isabel  (peeping  from  under  the  table  cloth).    Or  me  ? 


CRYSTAL  VIRTUES. 


57 


L.  Well,  I  don't  know.  They  never  forget  their  syntax, 
children,  when  once  they've  been  taught  it.  But  I  think  some 
of  them  are,  on  the  whole,  worse  than  any  of  you.  Not  that 
it's  amiable  of  you  to  look  so  radiant,  all  in  a  minute,  on  that 
account. 

Dora.  Oh  !  but  it's  so  much  more  comfortable. 

[Everybody  seems  to  recover  their  spirits.    Eclipse  of  Floe* 
me  and  Isabel  terminates.) 

L.  What  kindly  creatures  girls  are,  after  all,  to  their  neigh- 
bours' failings  !  I  think  you  may  be  ashamed  of  yourselves 
indeed,  now,  children  !  I  can  tell  you,  you  shall  hear  of  the 
highest  crystalline  merits  that  I  can  think  of,  to-day  :  and  I 
wish  there  were  more  of  them  ;  but  crystals  have  a  limited, 
though  a  stern,  code  of  morals ;  and  their  essential  virtues 
are  but  two  ; — the  first  is  to  be  pure,  and  the  second  to  be 
well  shaped. 

Mary.  Pure  !    Does  that  mean  clear — transparent  ? 

L.  No  ;  unless  in  the  case  of  a  transparent  substance.  You 
cannot  have  a  transparent  crystal  of  gold  ;  but  you  may  have 
a  perfectly  pure  one. 

Isabel.  But  you  said  it  was  the  shape  that  made  things  be 
crystals  ;  therefore,  oughtn't  their  shape  to  be  their  first  vir- 
tue, not  their  second  ? 

L.  Eight,  you  troublesome  mousie.  But  I  call  their  shape 
only  their  second  virtue,  because  it  depends  on  time  and  ac- 
cident, and  things  which  the  crystal  cannot  help.  If  it  is 
cooled  too  quickly,  or  shaken,  it  must  take  what  shape  it  can  ; 
but  it  seems  as  if,  even  then,  it  had  in  itself  the  power  of  re- 
jecting impurity,  if  it  has  crystalline  life  enough.  Here  is  a 
crystal  of  quartz,  well  enough  shaped  in  its  way  ;  but  it  seems 
to  have  been  languid  and  sick  at  heart ;  and  some  white  milky 
substance  has  got  into  it,  and  mixed  itself  up  with  it,  all 
through.  It  makes  the  quartz  quite  yellow,  if  you  hold  it  up 
to  the  light,  and  milky  blue  on  the  surface.  Here  is  another, 
broken  into  a  thousand  separate  facets,  and  out  of  all  trace- 
able shape  ;  but  as  pure  as  a  mountain  spring.  I  like  this 
one  best. 


58 


THE  ETHICS  OF  THE  DUST. 


The  Audience.  So  do  I — and  I — and  I. 
Mary.  Would  a  crystallographer  ? 

L.  I  think  so.  He  would  find  many  more  laws  curiously 
exemplified  in  the  irregularly  grouped  but  pure  crystal.  But 
it  is  a  futile  question,  this  of  first  or  second.  Parity  is  in 
most  cases  a  prior,  if  not  a  nobler,  virtue  ;  at  all  events  it  is 
most  convenient  to  think  about  it  first. 

Mary.  But  what  ought  we  to  think  about  it?  Is  there  much 
to  be  thought — I  mean,  much  to  puzzle  one  ? 

L.  I  don't  know  what  you  call  4  much.'  It  is  a  long  time 
since  I  met  with  anything  in  which  there  was  little.  There's 
not  much  in  this,  perhaps.  The  crystal  must  be  either  dirty 
or  clean, — and  there's  an  end.  So  it  is  with  one's  hands,  and 
with  one's  heart — only  you  can  wash  your  hands  without 
changing  them,  but  not  hearts,  nor  crystals.  On  the  whole, 
while  you  are  young,  it  will  be  as  well  to  take  care  that  your 
hearts  don't  want  much  washing  ;  for  they  may  perhaps  need 
wringing  also,  when  they  do. 

{Audience  doubtful  and  uncomfortable.    Lucilla  at  last 
takes  courage.) 

Lucilla.  Oh  !  but  surely,  sir,  we  cannot  make  our  hearts 
clean  ? 

L.  Not  easily,  Lucilla  ;  so  you  had  better  keep  them  so 
when  they  are. 

Lucilla.  When  they  are  !    But,  sir — 
L.  Well? 

Lucilla.  Sir — surely — are  we  not  told  that  they  are  all 
evil  ? 

L.  Wait  a  little,  Lucilla  ;  that  is  difficult  ground  you  are 
getting  upon  ;  and  we  must  keep  to  our  crystals,  till  at  least 
we  understand  what  their  good  and  evil  consist  in  ;  they  may 
help  us  afterwards  to  some  useful  hints  about  our  own.  I 
said  that  their  goodness  consisted  chiefly  in  purity  of  sub- 
stance, and  perfectness  of  form :  but  those  ars  rather  the 
effects  of  their  goodness,  than  the  goodness  itself,  The  inher- 
ent virtues  of  the  crystals,  resulting  in  these  outer  conditions, 
might  really  seem  to  be  best  described  in  the  words  we  should 


CRYSTAL  VIRTUES. 


59 


use  respecting  living  creatures — '  force  of  heart*  and  'steadi- 
ness of  purpose.'  There  seem  to  be  in  some  crystals,  from 
the  beginning,  an  unconquerable  purity  of  vital  power,  and 
strength  of  crystal  spirit.  Whatever  dead  substance,  unac- 
ceptant  of  this  energy,  comes  in  their  way,  is  either  rejected, 
or  forced  to  take  some  beautiful  subordinate  form  ;  the  purity 
of  the  crystal  remains  unsullied,  and  every  atom  of  it  bright 
with  coherent  energy.  Then  the  second  condition  is,  that 
from  the  beginning  of  its  whole  structure,  a  fine  crystal  seems 
to  have  determined  that  it  will  be  of  a  certain  size  and  of  a 
certain  shape  ;  it  persists  in  this  plan,  and  completes  it. 
Here  is  a  perfect  crystal  of  quartz  for  you.  It  is  of  an  un- 
usual form,  and  one  which  it  might  seem  very  difficult  to  build 
— a  pyramid  with  convex  sides,  composed  of  other  minor  pyra- 
mids. But  there  is  not  a  flaw  in  its  contour  throughout ;  not 
one  of  its  myriads  of  component  sides  but  is  as  bright  as  a 
jeweller's  facetted  work  (and  far  finer,  if  you  saw  it  close). 
The  crystal  points  are  as  sharp  as  javelins ;  their  edges  vvill 
cut  glass  with  a  touch.  Anything  more  resolute,  consummate, 
determinate  in  form,  cannot  be  conceived.  Here,  on  the 
other  hand,  is  a  crystal  of  the  same  substance,  in  a  perfectly 
simple  type  of  form — a  plain  six-sided  prism  ;  but  from  its 
base  to  its  point, — and  it  is  nine  inches  long, — it  has  never 
for  one  instant  made  up  its  mind  what  thickness  it  will  have. 
It  seems  to  have  begun  by  making  itself  as  thick  as  it  thought 
possible  with  the  quantity  of  material  at  command.  Still  not 
being  as  thick  as  it  would  like  to  be,  it  has  clumsily  glued  on 
more  substance  at  one  of  its  sides.  Then  it  has  thinned  itself, 
in  a  panic  of  economy ;  then  puffed  itself  out  again  ;  tliea 
starved  one  side  to  enlarge  another  ;  then  warped  itself  quite 
out  of  its  first  line.  Opaque,  rough-surfaced,  jagged  on  the 
edge,  distorted  in  the  spine,  it  exhibits  a  quite  human  imag** 
of  decrepitude  and  dishonour  ;  but  the  worst  of  all  the  signs 
of  its  decay  and  helplessness,  is  that  half-way  up,  a  parasite 
crystal,  smaller,  but  just  as  sickly,  has  rooted  itself  in  the  side 
of  the  larger  one,  eating  out  a  cavity  round  its  root,  and  then 
growing  backwards,  or  downwards,  contrary  to  the  direction 
of  the  main  crystal.    Yet  I  cannot  trace  the  least  difference  in 


80 


THE  ETHICS  OF  THE  DUST. 


purity  of  substance  between  the  first  most  noble  stone,  and 
this  ignoble  and  dissolute  one.  The  impurity  of  the  last  is 
in  its  will,  or  want  of  will. 

Mary.  Oh,  if  we  could  but  understand  the  meaning  of  it 
all! 

L.  We  can  understand  all  that  is  good  for  us.  It  is  just  as 
true  for  us,  as  for  the  crystal,  that  the  nobleness  of  life  de- 
pends on  its  consistency, — clearness  of  purpose, — quiet  and 
ceaseless  energy.  All  doubt,  and  repenting,  and  botching, 
and  retouching,  and  wondering  what  it  will  be  best  to  do 
next,  are  vice,  as  well  as  misery. 

Mary  (much  wondering).  But  must  not  one  repent  when  one 
does  wrong,  and  hesitate  when  one  can't  see  one's  way  ? 

L.  You  have  no  business  at  all  to  do  wrong ;  nor  to  get 
into  any  way  that  you  cannot  see.  Your  intelligence  should 
always  be  far  in  advance  of  your  act.  Whenever  you  do  not 
know  what  you  are  about,  you  are  sure  to  be  doing  wrong. 

Kathleen.  Oh,  dear,  but  I  never  know  what  I  am  about ! 

L.  Very  true,  Katie,  but  it  is  a  great  deal  to  know,  if  you 
know  that.  And  you  find  that  you  have  done  wrong  after- 
wards ;  and  perhaps  some  day  you  may  begin  to  know,  or  at 
least,  think,  what  you  are  about. 

Isabel.  But  surely  people  can't  do  very  wrong  if  they  don't 
know,  can  they  ?  I  mean,  they  can't  be  very  naughty.  They 
can  be  wrong,  like  Kathleen  or  me,  when  we  make  mistakes  ; 
but  not  wrong  in  the  dreadful  way.  I  can't  express  what  I 
mean  ;  but  there  are  two  sorts  of  wrong  are  there  not  ? 

L.  Yes,  Isabel ;  but  you  will  find  that  the  great  difference 
is  between  kind  and  unkind  wrongs,  not  between  meant  and 
unmeant  wrong.  Very  few  people  really  mean  to  do  wrong, 
— in  a  deep  sense,  none.  They  only  don't  know  what  they 
are  about.  Cain  did  not  mean  to  do  wrong  when  he  killed 
Abel. 

(Isabel  draws  a  deep  breath,  and  opens  her  eyes  very  wide.) 

L.  No,  Isabel ;  and  there  are  countless  Cains  among  us 
now,  who  kill  their  brothers  by  the  score  a  day,  not  only  for 
less  provocation  than  Cain  had,  but  for  no  provocation,— and 


CRYSTAL  VIRTUES. 


61 


merely  for  what  they  can  make  of  their  bones, — yet  do  not 
think  they  are  doing  wrong  in  the  least.  Then  sometimes 
you  have  the  business  reversed,  as  over  in  America  these  last 
years,  where  you  have  seen  Abel  resolutely  killing  Cain,  and 
not  thinking  he  is  doing  wrong.  The  great  difficulty  is 
always  to  open  people's  eyes  :  to  touch  their  feelings,  and 
break  their  hearts,  is  easy  ;  the  difficult  thing  is  to  break 
their  heads.  What  does  it  matter,  as  long  as  they  remain 
stupid,  whether  you  change  their  feelings  or  not?  You  can- 
not be  always  at  their  elbow  to  tell  them  what  is  right :  and 
they  may  just  do  as  wrong  as  before,  or  worse  ;  and  their  best 
intentions  merely  make  the  road  smooth  for  them, — you  know 
where,  children.  For  it  is  not  the  place  itself  that  is  paved 
with  them,  as  people  say  so  often.  You  can't  pave  the  bot- 
tomless pit ;  but  you  may  the  road  to  it. 

May.  Well,  but  if  people  do  as  well  as  they  can  see  how, 
surely  that  is  the  right  for  them,  isn't  it  ? 

L.  No,  May,  not  a  bit  of  it ;  right  is  right,  and  wrong  is 
wrong.  It  is  only  the  fool  who  does  wrong,  and  says  he  *  did 
it  for  the  best.'  And  if  there's  one  sort  of  person  in  the  world 
that  the  Bible  speaks  harder  of  than  another,  it  is  fools.  Their 
particular  and  chief  way  of  saying  6  There  is  no  God  '  is  this, 
of  declaring  that  whatever  their  '  public  opinion  '  may  be,  is 
right :  and  that  God's  opinion  is  of  no  consequence. 

May.  But  surely  nobody  can  always  know  what  is  right  ? 

L.  Yes,  you  always  can,  for  to  day ;  and  if  you  do  what 
you  see  of  it  to-day,  you  will  see  more  of  it,  and  more  clearly, 
to-morrow.  Here,  for  instance,  you  children  are  at  school, 
and  have  to  learn  French,  and  arithmetic,  and  music,  and  sev- 
eral other  such  things.  That  is  your  6  right '  for  the  present ; 
the  1  right '  for  us,  your  teachers,  is  to  see  that  you  learn  as 
much  as  you  can,  without  spoiling  your  dinner,  your  sleep,  or 
your  play  ;  and  that  what  you  do  learn,  you  learn  well.  You 
all  know  when  you  learn  with  a  will,  and  when  you  dawdle. 
There's  no  doubt  of  conscience  about  that,  I  suppose  ? 

Violet.  No  ;  but  if  one  wants  to  read  an  amusing  book,  in- 
stead of  learning  one's  lesson  ? 

L.  You  don't  call  that  a  ' question/  seriously,  Violet  ?  You 


62 


THE  ETHICS  OF  THE  DUST. 


are  then  merely  deciding  whether  you  will  resolutely  do 
wrong  or  not. 

Mary.  But,  in  after  life,  how  many  fearful  difficulties  may 
arise,  however  one  tries  to  know  or  to  do  what  is  right ! 

L.  You  are  much  too  sensible  a  girl,  Mary,  to  have  felt 
that,  whatever  you  may  have  seen.  A  great  many  of  young 
ladies'  difficulties  arise  from  their  falling  in  love  with  a  wrong 
person :  but  they  have  no  business  to  let  themselves  fall  in 
love,  till  they  know  he  is  the  right  one. 

Dora.  How  many  thousands  ought  he  to  have  a  year  ? 

L.  {disdaining  reply).  There  are,  of  course,  certain  crises 
of  fortune  when  one  has  to  take  care  of  oneself,  and  mind 
shrewdly  what  one  is  about.  There  is  never  any  real  doubt 
about  the  path,  but  you  may  have  to  walk  very  slowly. 

Mary.  And  if  one  is  forced  to  do  a  wrong  thing  by  some 
one  who  has  authority  over  you  ? 

L.  My  dear,  no  one  can  be  forced  to  do  a  wrong  thing,  for 
the  guilt  is  in  the  will :  but  you  may  any  day  be  forced  to  do 
a  fatal  thing,  as  you  might  be  forced  to  take  poison  ;  the  re- 
markable law  of  nature  in  such  cases  being,  that  it  is  always 
unfortunate  you  who  are  poisoned,  and  not  the  person  who 
gives  you  the  dose.  It  is  a  very  strange  law,  but  it  is  a  law. 
Nature  merely  sees  to  the  carrying  out  of  the  normal  opera- 
tion of  arsenic.  She  never  troubles  herself  to  ask  who  gave 
it  you.  So  also  you  may  be  starved  to  death,  morally  as 
well  as  physically,  by  other  people's  faults.  You  are,  on  the 
whole,  very  good  children  sitting  here  to-day  ; — do  you  think 
that  your  goodness  comes  all  by  your  own  contriving  ?  or 
that  you  are  gentle  and  kind  because  your  dispositions  are 
naturally  more  angelic  than  those  of  the  poor  girls  who  are 
playing,  with  wild  eyes,  on  the  dustheaps  in  the  alleys  of  our 
great  towns  ;  and  who  will  one  day  fill  their  prisons, — or, 
better,  their  graves  ?  Heaven  only  knows  where  they,  and 
we  who  have  cast  them  there,  shall  stand  at  last.  But  the 
main  judgment  question  will  be,  I  suppose,  for  all  of  us,  'Did 
you  keep  a  good  heart  through  it  ? '  What  you  were,  others 
may  answer  for  ; — what  you  tried  to  be,  you  must  answer  for, 
yourself.    Was  the  heart  pure  and  true — tell  us  that  ? 


CRYSTAL  VIRTUES. 


63 


And  so  we  come  back  to  your  sorrowful  question,  Lucilla, 
which  I  put  aside  a  little  ago.  You  would  be  afraid  to  an- 
swer that  your  heart  was  pure  and  true,  would  not  you  ? 

Lucilla.  Yes,  indeed,  sir. 

L.  Because  you  have  been  taught  that  it  is  all  evil — '  only 
evil  continually.'  Somehow,  often  as  people  say  that,  they 
never  seem,  to  me,  to  believe  it  ?    Do  you  really  believe  it  ? 

Lucilla.  Yes,  sir  ;  I  hope  so. 

L.  That  you  have  an  entirely  bad  heart  ? 

Lucilla  (a  little  uncomfortable  at  the  substitution  of  the  mono- 
syllable for  the  dissyllable,  nevertheless  persisting  in  her  ortho- 
doxy).   Yes,  sir. 

L.  Florrie,  I  am  sure  you  are  tired  ;  I  never  like  you  to 
stay  when  you  are  tired  ;  but,  you  know,  you  must  not  play 
with  the  kitten  while  we're 'talking. 

Florrie.  Oh !  but  I'm  not  tired  ;  and  I'm  only  nursing  her. 
She'll  be  asleep  in  my  lap  directly. 

L.  Stop  !  that  puts  me  in  mind  of  something  I  had  to  show 
you,  about  minerals  that  are  like  hair.  I  want  a  hair  out  of 
Tittie's  tail 

Florrie  (quite  rude,  in  her  surprise,  even  to  the  point  of  re- 
peating expressions) .    Out  of  Tittie's  tail ! 

L.  Yes  ;  a  brown  one  :  Lucilla,  you  can  get  at  the  tip  of  it 
nicely,  under  Florrie's  arm  ;  just  pull  one  out  for  me. 

Lucilla.  Oh  !  but,  sir,  it  will  hurt  her  so  ! 

L.  Never  mind  ;  she  can't  scratch  you  while  Florrie  is 
holding  her.  Now  that  I  think  of  it,  you  had  better  pull  out 
two. 

Lucilla.  Bat  then  she  may  scratch  Florrie  !  and  it  will 
hurt  her  so,  sir !  if  you  only  want  brown  hairs,  wouldn't  two 
of  mine  do  ? 

L.  Would  you  really  rather  pull  out  your  own  than  Tittie's? 
Lucilla.  Oh,  of  course,  if  mine  will  do. 
L.  But  that's  very  wicked,  Lucilla  ! 
Lucilla.  Wicked,  sir? 

L.  Yes  ;  if  your  heart  was  not  so  bad,  you  would  much 
rather  pull  all  the  cat's  hairs  out,  than  one  of  your  own. 
Lucilla.  Oh !  but  sir,  I  didn't  mean  bad,  like  that 


64 


THE  ETHICS  OF  THE  DUST. 


L  I  believe,  if  the  truth  were  told,  Lucilla,  you  would  like 
to  tie  a  kettle  to  Tittie's  tail,  and  hunt  her  round  the  play, 
ground. 

Lucilla.  Indeed,  I  should  not,  sir. 

L.  That's  not  true,  Lucilla  ;  you  know  it  cannot  be. 

Lucilla.  Sir? 

L.  Certainly  it  is  not; — how  can  you  possibly  speak  any 
truth  out  of  such  a  heart  as  you  have  ?  It  is  wholly  deceitful. 

Lucilla.  Oh  !  no,  no  ;  I  don't  mean  that  way ;  I  don't  mean 
that  it  makes  me  tell  lies,  quite  out. 

L.  Only  that  it  tells  lies  within  you  ? 

Lucilla.  Yes. 

L.  Then,  outside  of  it,  you  know  what  is  true,  and  say  so ; 
and  I  may  trust  the  outside  of  your  heart ;  but  within,  it  is 
all  foul  and  false.    Is  that  the  way  ? 

Lucilla.  I  suppose  so  :  I  don't  understand  it,  quite. 

L.  There  is  no  occasion  for  understanding  it ;  but  do  you 
feel  it  ?  Are  you  sure  that  your  heart  is  deceitful  above  all 
things,  and  desperately  wicked  ? 

Lucilla  [much  relieved  by  finding  herself  among  phrases  with 
which  she  is  acquainted).    Yes,  sir.    I'm  sure  of  that. 

L.  (pensively).  I'm  sorry  for  it,  Lucilla. 

Lucilla.  So  am  I,  indeed. 

L.  What  are  you  sorry  with,  Lucilla? 

Lucilla.  Sorry  with,  sir  ? 

L.  Yes  ;  I  mean,  where  do  you  feel  sorry  ?  in  your  feet  ? 
Lucilla  (laughing  a  little).  No,  sir,  of  course. 
L.  In  your  shoulders,  then  ? 
Lucilla.  No,  sir. 

L.  You  are  sure  of  that  ?  Because,  I  fear,  sorrow  in  the 
shoulders  would  not  be  worth  much. 

Lucilla.  I  suppose  I  feel  it  in  my  heart,  if  I  really  am 
sorry. 

L.  If  you  really  are  !    Do  you  mean  to  say  that  you  ara 
sure  you  are  utterly  wicked,  and  yet  do  not  care  ? 
Lucilla.  No,  indeed  ;  I  have  cried  about  it  often. 
L.  Well,  then,  you  are  sorry  in  your  heart  ? 
Lucilla.  Yes,  when  the  sorrow  is  worth  anything. 


CRYSTAL  VIRTUES. 


65 


L.  Even  if  it  be  not,  it  cannot  be  anywhere  else  but  there. 
It  is  not  the  crystalline  lens  of  your  eyes  which  is  sorry,  wThen 
you  cry  ? 

Lucilla.  No,  sir,  of  course. 

L.  Then,  have  you  two  hearts ;  one  of  which  is  wicked,  and 
the  other  grieved  ?  or  is  one  side  of  it  sorry  for  the  other  side  ? 

Lucilla  [weary  of  cross-examination,  and  a  little  vexed). 
Indeed,  sir,  you  know  I  can't  understand  it ;  but  you  know 
how  it  is  written — 6  another  law  in  my  members,  warring 
against  the  law  of  my  mind/ 

L.  Yes,  Lucilla,  I  know  how  it  is  written  ;  but  I  do  not  see 
that  it  will  help  us  to  know  that,  if  we  neither  understand 
wThat  is  written,  nor  feel  it.  And  you  will  not  get  nearer  to 
the  meaning  of  one  verse,  if,  as  soon  as  you  are  puzzled  by  it, 
you  escape  to  another,  introducing  three  new  words — '  law/ 
Members,'  and  'mind';  not  one  of  which  you  at  present 
know  the  meaning  of  ;  and  respecting  which,  you  probably 
never  will  be  much  wiser  ;  since  men  like  Montesquieu  and 
Locke  have  spent  great  part  of  their  lives  in  endeavouring  to 
explain  two  of  them. 

Lucilla.  Oh  !  please,  sir,  ask  somebody  else. 

L.  If  I  thought  anyone  else  could  answer  better  than  you, 
Lucilla,  I  would  ;  but  suppose  I  try,  instead,  myself,  to  ex- 
plain your  feelings  to  you  ? 

Lucilla.  Oh,  yes  ;  please  do. 

L.  Mind,  I  say  your  'feelings/  not  your  'belief/  For  I 
cannot  undertake  to  explain  anybody's  beliefs.  Still  I  must 
try  a  little,  first,  to  explain  the  belief  also,  because  I  want  to 
draw  it  to  some  issue.  As  far  as  I  understand  what  you  say, 
or  any  one  else,  taught  as  you  have  been  taught,  says,  on 
this  matter, — you  think  that  there  is  an  external  goodness,  a 
whited-sepulchre  kind  of  goodness,  which  appears  beautiful 
outwardly,  but  is  within  full  of  uncleanness :  a  deep  secret 
guilt,  of  which  wre  ourselves  are  not  sensible  ;  and  which  can 
only  be  seen  by  the  Maker  of  us  all.  (Approving  murmuri 
from  audience.) 

L.  Is  it  not  so  with  the  body  as  well  as  the  soul  ? 
{Looked  notes  of  interrogation.) 


THE  ETHICS  OF  THE  DUST. 


L.  A  skull,  for  instance,  is  not  a  beautiful  thing  ? 

(Grave  faces,  signifying  6  Certainly  not,'  and  '  What  next? '\ 

L.  And  if  you  all  could  see  in  each  other,  with  clear  eyes, 
whatever  God  sees  beneath  those  fair  faces  of  yours,  you 
would  not  like  it  ? 

(Murmured  'No's.') 

L.  Nor  would  it  be  good  for  you  ? 

(Silence.) 

L.  The  probability  being  that  what  God  does  not  allow  you 
to  see,  He  does  not  wish  you  to  see  ;  nor  even  to  think  of  2 

(Silence  prolonged.) 

L.  It  would  not  at  all  be  good  for  you,  for  instance,  when- 
ever you  were  washing  your  faces,  and  braiding  your  hair,  to 
be  thinking  of  the  shapes  of  the  jawbones,  and  of  the  carti- 
lage of  the  nose,  and  of  the  jagged  sutures  of  the  scalp  ? 

(Resolutely  whispered  No's.) 

L.  Still  less,  to  see  through  a  clear  glass  the  daily  pro- 
cesses of  nourishment  and  decay  ? 
(No.) 

L.  Still  less  if  instead  of  merely  inferior  and  preparatory 
conditions  of  structure,  as  in  the  skeleton, — or  inferior  offices 
of  structure,  as  in  operations  of  life  and  death, — there  were 
actual  disease  in  the  body ;  ghastly  and  dreadful.  You  would 
try  to  cure  it ;  but  having  taken  such  measures  as  were  neces- 
sary, you  would  not  think  the  cure  likely  to  be  promoted  by 
perpetually  watching  the  wounds,  or  thinking  of  them.  On 
the  contrary,  you  would  be  thankful  for  every  moment  of  for- 
getfulness :  as,  in  daily  health,  you  must  be  thankful  that 
your  Maker  has  veiled  whatever  is  fearful  in  your  frame  under 
a  sweet  and  manifest  beauty  ;  and  has  made  it  your  duty,  and 
your  only  safet}^  to  rejoice  in  that,  both  in  yourself  and  in 
others  : — not  indeed  concealing,  or  refusing  to  believe  in  sick- 
ness, if  it  come  ;  but  never  dwelling  on  it. 

Now,  your  wisdom  and  duty  touching  soul-sickness  are  just 
the  same.    Ascertain  clearly  what  is  wrong  with  you  ;  and  so 


CRYSTAL  VIRTUES. 


67 


far  as  you  know  any  means  of  mending  it,  take  those  means, 
and  have  done  :  when  you  aie  examining  yourself,  never  call 
yourself  merely  a  '  sinner,'  that  is  very  cheap  abuse  ;  and  ut- 
terly useless.  You  may  even  get  to  like  it,  and  be  proud  of 
it  But  call  yourself  a  liar,  a  coward,  a  sluggard,  a  glutton^ 
or  an  evil-eyed  jealous  wretch,  if  you  indeed  find  yourself  to 
be  in  any  wise  any  of  these.  Take  steady  means  to  check 
yourself  in  whatever  fault  you  have  ascertained,  and  justly  ac- 
cused yourself  of.  And  as  soon  as  you  are  in  active  way  of 
mending,  you  will  be  no  more  inclined  to  moan  over  an  unde- 
fined corruption.  For  the  rest,  you  will  find  it  less  easy  to 
uproot  faults,  than  to  choke  them  by  gaining  virtues.  Do  not 
think  of  your  faults  ;  still  less  of  others'  faults :  in  every 
person  who  comes  near  you,  look  for  what  is  good  and  strong : 
honour  that  ;  rejoice  in  it ;  and,  as  you  can,  try  to  imitate  it : 
and  your  faults  will  drop  off,  like  dead  leaves,  when  their 
time  comes.  If,  on  looking  back,  your  whole  life  should 
seem  rugged  as  a  palm  tree  stem  ;  still,  never  mind,  so  long- 
as  it  has  been  growing ;  and  has  its  grand  green  shade  of 
leaves,  and  weight  of  honied  fruit,  at  top.  And  even  if  you 
cannot  find  much  good  in  yourself  at  last,  think  that  it  does 
not  much  matter  to  the  universe  either  what  you  were,  or 
are  ;  think  how  many  people  are  noble,  if  you  cannot  be  ;  and 
rejoice  in  their  nobleness.  An  immense  quantity  of  modern 
confession  of  sin,  even  when  honest,  is  merely  a  sickly  ego- 
tism ;  which  will  rather  gloat  over  its  own  evil,  than  lose  the 
centralisation  of  its  interest  in  itself. 

Mary.  But  then,  if  we  ought  to  forget  ourselves  so  much, 
how  did  the  old  Greek  proverb  '  Know  thyself '  come  to  be  so 
highly  esteemed  ? 

L.  My  dear,  it  is  the  proverb  of  proverbs ;  Apollo's  prov- 
erb, and  the  sun's  ; — but  do  you  think  you  can  know  yourself 
by  looking  into  yourself  ?  Never.  You  can  know  what  you 
are,  only  by  looking  out  of  yourself.  Measure  your  own 
powers  with  those  of  others  ;  compare  your  own  interests 
with  those  of  others ;  try  to  understand  what  you  appear  to 
them,  as  well  as  what  they  appear  to  you  ;  and  judge  of  your- 
selves, in  all  things,  relatively  and  subordinately  ;  not  posi- 


68 


THE  ETHICS  OF  THE  DUST. 


tively  :  starting  always  with  a  wholesome  conviction  of  the 
probability  that  there  is  nothing  particular  about  you.  For 
instance,  some  of  you  perhaps  think  you  can  write  poetry. 
Dwell  on  your  own  feelings  and  doings  : — and  you  will  soon 
think  yourselves  Tenth  Muses  ;  but  forget  your  own  feelings ; 
and  try,  instead,  to  understand  a  line  or  two  of  Chaucer  or 
Dante  :  and  you  will  soon  begin  to  feel  yourselves  very  fool- 
ish girls — which  is  much  like  the  fact. 

So,  something  which  befalls  you  may  seem  a  great  misfort- 
une ; — you  meditate  over  its  effects  on  you  personally  ;  and 
begin  to  think  that  it  is  a  chastisement,  or  a  warning,  or  a 
this  or  that  or  the  other  of  profound  significance  ;  and  that 
all  the  angels  in  heaven  have  left  their  business  for  a  little 
while,  that  they  may  watch  its  effects  on  your  mind.  But 
give  up  this  egotistic  indulgence  of  your  fancy  ;  examine  a 
little  what  misfortunes,  greater  a  thousandfold,  are  happen- 
ing, every  second,  to  twenty  times  worthier  persons  :  and  your 
self-consciousness  wTill  change  into  pity  and  humility  ;  and 
you  will  know  yourself,  so  far  as  to  understand  that  e  there 
hath  nothing  taken  thee  but  what  is  common  to  man.' 

Now,  Lucilla,  these  are  the  practical  conclusions  which  any 
person  of  sense  would  arrive  at,  supposing  the  texts  which  re- 
late to  the  inner  evil  of  the  heart  were  as  many,  and  as  prom- 
inent, as  they  are  often  supposed  to  be  by  careless  readers. 
But  the  way  in  which  common  people  read  their  Bibles  is  just 
like  the  way  that  the  old  monks  thought  hedgehogs  ate 
grapes.  They  rolled  themselves  (it  was  said),  over  and  over, 
where  the  grapes  lay  on  the  ground.  What  fruit  stuck  to 
their  spines,  they  carried  off,  and  ate.  So  your  hedgehoggy 
readers  roll  themselves  over  and  over  their  Bibles,  and  declare 
that  whatever  sticks  to  their  own  spines  is  Scripture  ;  and 
that  nothing  else  is.  But  you  can  only  get  the  skins  of  the 
texts  that  way.  If  you  want  their  juice,  you  must  press  them 
in  cluster.  Now,  the  clustered  texts  about  the  human  heart, 
insist,  as  a  body,  not  on  any  inherent  corruption  in  all  hearts, 
but  on  the  terrific  distinction  between  the  bad  and  the  good 
ones.  '  A  good  man,  out  of  the  good  treasure  of  his  heart, 
bringeth  forth  that  which  is  good  ;  and  an  evil  man,  out  of 


CRYSTAL  VIRTUES, 


69 


the  evil  treasure,  bringeth  forth  that  which  is  evil/  ' They  on 
the  rock  are  they  which,  in  an  honest  and  good  heart,  having 
heard  the  word,  keep  it.'  '  Delight  thyself  in  the  Lord,  and 
He  shall  give  thee  the  desires  of  thine  heart.'  *  The  wicked 
have  bent  their  bow,  that  they  may  privily  shoot  at  him  that 
is  upright  in  heart.5  And  so  on  ;  they  are  countless,  to  the 
same  effect  And,  for  al]  of  us,  the  question  is  not  at  all  to 
ascertain  how  much  or  how  little  corruption  there  is  in  human 
nature  ;  but  to  ascertain  whether,  out  of  all  the  mass  of  that 
nature,  we  are  of  the  sheep  or  the  goat  breed ;  whether  we 
are  people  of  upright  heart,  being  shot  at,  or  people  of 
crooked  heart,  shooting.  And,  of  all  the  texts  bearing  on  the 
subject,  this,  which  is  a  quite  simple  and  practical  order,  is 
the  one  you  have  chiefly  to  hold  in  mind.  'Keep  thy  heart 
with  all  diligence,  for  out  of  it  are  the  issues  of  life.' 

Lucilla.  And  yet,  how  inconsistent  the  texts  seem  ! 

L.  Nonsense,  Lucilla  !  do  you  think  the  universe  is  bound 
to  look  consistent  to  a  girl  of  fifteen  ?  Look  up  at  your  own 
room  window  ; — you  can  just  see  it  from  where  you  sit.  I'm 
glad  that  it  is  left  open,  as  it  ought  to  be,  in  so  fine  a  day. 
But  do  you  see  what  a  black  spot  it  looks,  in  the  sun-lighted 
wall? 

Lucilla.  Yes,  it  looks  as  black  as  ink. 

L.  Yet  you  know  it  is  a  very  bright  room  when  you  are 
inside  of  it ;  quite  as  bright  as  there  is  any  occasion  for  it  to 
be,  that  its  little  lady  may  see  to  keep  it  tidy.  Well,  it  is  very 
probable,  also,  that  if  you  could  look  into  your  heart  from  the 
sun's  point  of  view,  it  might  appear  a  very  black  hole  indeed  : 
nay,  the  sun  may  sometimes  think  good  to  tell  you  that  it 
looks  so  to  Him  ;  but  He  will  come  into  it,  and  make  it  very 
cheerful  for  you,  for  all  that,  if  you  don't  put  the  shutters  up. 
And  the  one  question  for  you,  remember,  is  not  '  dark  or 
light  ?  '  but  '  tidy  or  untidy  ? '  Look  well  to  your  sweeping 
and  garnishing  ;  and  be  sure  it  is  only  the  banished  spirit,  or 
some  of  the  seven  wickeder  ones  at  his  back,  who  will  stil] 
whisper  to  you  that  it  is  all  black. 


LECTURE  VI. 


CRYSTAL  QUARRELS, 

Wall  vortclave,  in  Schoolroom.  There-has  been  a  game  at  erystallisatiop,  in 
the  morning,  of  which  various  account  has  to  be  rendered.  In  partic* 
tddr,  everybody  has  to  explain  why  they  were  always  where  they  were  not 
intended  to  be. 

L.  (having  received  and  considered  the  report).  You  have 
got  on  pretty  well,  children :  but  you  know  these  were  easy 
figures  you  have  been  trying.  "Wait  till  I  have  drawn  you 
out  the  plans  of  some  crystals  of  snow  ! 

Mary.  I  don't  think  those  will  be  the  most  difficult :— they 
are  so  beautiful  that  we  shall  remember  our  places  better ; 
and  then  they  are  all  regular,  and  in  stars  :  it  is  those  twisty 
oblique  ones  we  are  afraid  of. 

L.  Bead  Carlyle's  account  of  the  battle  of  Leuthen,  and 
learn  Freidrich's  'oblique  order/  You  will  'get  it  done  for 
once,  I  think,  provided  you  can  march  as  a  pair  of  compasses 
would.'  But  remember,  when  you  can  construct  the  most 
difficult  single  figures,  you  have  only  learned  half  the  game 
— nothing  so  much  as  the  half,  indeed,  as  the  crystals  them- 
selves play  it. 

Mary.  Indeed  ;  what  else  is  there  ? 

L.  It  is  seldom  that  any  mineral  crystallises  alone.  Usually 
two  or  three,  under  quite  different  crystalline  laws,  form  to- 
gether. They  do  this  absolutely  without  flaw  or  fault,  when 
they  are  in  fine  temper  :  and  observe  what  this  signifies. 
It  signifies  that  the  two,  or  more,  minerals  of  different  natures 
agree,  somehow,  between  themselves,  how  much  space  each 
will  want ; — agree  which  of  them  shall  give  away  to  the  other 
at  their  junction  ;  or  in  what  measure  each  will  accommodate 
itself  to  the  other's  shape !  And  then  each  takes  its  per- 
mitted shape,  and  allotted  share  of  space  ;  yielding,  or  being 


CRYSTAL  QUARRELS. 


71 


yielded  to,  as  it  builds,  till  each  crystal  has  fitted  itself  per- 
fectly and  gracefully  to  its  differently-natured  neighbour. 
So  that,  in  order  to  practise  this,  in  even  the  simplest  terms, 
you  must  divide  into  two  parties,  wearing  different  colours  ; 
each  much  choose  a  different  figure  to  construct  ;  and  you 
must  form  one  of  these  figures  through  the  other,  both  going 
on  at  the  same  time. 

Mary.  I  think  we  may,  perhaps,  manage  it ;  but  I  cannot 
at  all  understand  how  the  crystals  do.  It  seems  to  imply  so 
much  preconcerting  of  plan,  and  so  much  giving  way  to  each 
other,  as  if  they  really  were  living. 

L.  Yes,  it  implies  both  concurrence  and  compromise, 
regulating  all  wilfulness  of  design  :  and,  more  curious  still, 
the  crystals  do  not  always  give  way  to  each  other.  They  show 
exactly  the  same  varieties  of  temper  that  human  creatures 
might.  Sometimes  they  yield  the  required  place  with  per- 
fect grace  and  courtesy  ;  forming  fantastic,  but  exquisitely 
finished  groups  :  and  sometimes  they  will  not  yield  at  all ; 
but  fight  furiously  for  their  places,  losing  all  shape  and 
honour,  and  even  their  own  likeness,  in  the  contest. 

Mary.  But  is  not  that  wholly  wonderful  ?  How  is  it  that 
one  never  sees  it  spoken  of  in  books  ? 

L.  The  scientific  men  are  all  busy  in  determining  the  con- 
stant laws  under  which  the  struggle  takes  place  ;  these  indefi- 
nite humours  of  the  elements  are  of  no  interest  to  them. 
And  unscientific  people  rarely  give  themselves  the  trouble  of 
thinking  at  all  when  they  look  at  stones.  Not  that  it  is  of 
much  use  to  think  ;  the  more  one  thinks,  the  more  one  is 
puzzled. 

Mary.  Surely  it  is  more  wonderful  than  anything  in 
botany  ? 

L.  Everything  has  its  own  wonders  ;  but,  given  the  nature 
of  the  plant,  it  is  easier  to  understand  what  a  flower  will  do, 
and  why  it  does  it,  than,  given  anything  wre  as  yet  know  of 
stone-nature,  to  understand  what  a  crystal  will  do,  and  why 
it  does  it.  You  at  once  admit  a  kind  of  volition  and  choice, 
in  the  flower  ;  but  we  are  not  accustomed  to  attribute  anything 
of  the  kind  to  the  crystal.    Yet  there  is,  in  reality,  more  like* 


72 


THE  ETHICS  OF  THE  DUST. 


ness  to  some  conditions  of  human  feeling  among  stones  than 
among  plants.  There  is  a  far  greater  difference  between 
kindly-tempered  and  ill-tempered  crystals  of  the  same  mine- 
ral, than  between  any  two  specimens  of  the  same  flower :  and 
the  friendships  and  wars  of  crystals  depend  more  definitely 
and  curiously  on  their  varieties  of  disposition,  than  any  associ- 
ations of  flowers.  Here,  for  instance,  is  a  good  garnet,  living 
with  good  mica  ;  one  rich  red,  and  the  other  silver  white : 
the  mica  leaves  exactly  room  enough  for  the  garnet  to  crystal- 
lise comfortably  in  ;  and  the  garnet  lives  happily  in  its  little 
white  house  ;  fitted  to  it,  like  a  pholas  in  its  cell.  But  here 
are  wicked  garnets  living  with  wicked  mica.  See  what  ruin 
they  make  of  each  other !  You  cannot  tell  which  is  which  ; 
the  garnets  look  like  dull  red  stains  on  the  crumbling  stone. 
By  the  way,  I  never  could  understand,  if  St.  Gothard  is  a 
real  saint,  why  he  can't  keep  his  garnets  in  better  order. 
These  are  all  under  his  care  ;  but  I  suppose  there  are  too 
many  of  them  for  him  to  look  after.  The  streets  of  Airolo 
are  paved  with  them. 

May.  Paved  with  garnets? 

L.  With  mica-slate  and  garnets ;  I  broke  this  bit  out  of  a 
paving  stone.  Now  garnets  and  mica  are  natural  friends, 
and  generally  fond  of  each  other ;  but  you  see  how  they 
quarrel  when  they  are  ill  brought  up.  So  it  is  always.  Good 
crystals  are  friendly  with  almost  all  other  good  crystals, 
however  little  they  chance  to  see  of  each  other,  or  how- 
ever opposite  their  habits  may  be  ;  while  wicked  crystals 
quarrel  with  one  another,  though  they  may  be  exactly  alike 
in  habits,  and  see  each  other  continually.  And  of  course  the 
wicked  crystals  quarrel  with  the  good  ones. 

Isx\bel.  Then  do  the  good  ones  get  angry  ? 

L.  No,  never :  they  attend  to  their  own  work  and  life ; 
and  live  it  as  well  as  they  can,  though  they  are  always  the 
sufferers,  Here,  for  instance,  is  a  rock-crystal  of  the  purest 
race  and  finest  temper,  who  was  born,  unhappily  for  him,  in 
a  bad  neighbourhood,  near  Beaufort  in  Savoy  ;  and  he  has  had 
to  fight  with  vile  calcareous  mud  all  his  life.  See  here,  when  he 
was  but  a  child,  it  came  down  on  him,  and  nearly  buried  him ;  a 


CRYSTAL  QUARRELS. 


73 


weaker  crystal  would  have  died  in  despair  ;  but  he  only 
gathered  himself  together,  like  Hercules  against  the  serpents, 
and  threw  a  layer  of  crystal  over  the  clay  ;  conquered  it,— 
imprisoned  it, — and  lived  on.  Then,  when  he  was  a  little 
older,  came  more  clay  ;  and  poured  itself  upon  him  here,  at 
the  side  ;  and  he  has  laid  crystal  over  that,  and  lived  on,  in 
his  purity.  Then  the  clay  came  on  at  his  angles,  and  tried  to 
cover  them,  and  round  them  away  ;  but  upon  that  he  threw 
out  buttress-crystals  at  his  angles,  all  as  true  to  his  own 
central  line  as  chapels  round  a  cathedral  apse  ;  and  clustered 
them  round  the  clay  ;  and  conquered  it  again.  At  last  the 
clay  came  on  at  his  summit,  and  tried  to  blunt  his  summit ;  but 
he  could  not  endure  that  for  an  instant ;  and  left  his  flanks 
all  rough,  but  pure  ;  and  fought  the  clay  at  his  crest,  and 
built  crest  over  crest,  and  peak  over  peak,  till  the  clay  sur- 
rendered at  last  ;  and  here  is  his  summit,  smooth  and  pure, 
terminating  a  pyramid  of  alternate  clay  and  crystal,  half  a 
foot  high  ! 

Lily.  Oh,  how  nice  of  him !  What  a  dear,  brave  crystal ! 
But  I  can't  bear  to  see  his  flanks  all  broken,  and  the  clay 
within  them. 

L.  Yes ;  it  was  an  evil  chance  for  him,  the  being  born  to 
such  contention  ;  there  are  some  enemies  so  base  that  even 
to  hold  them  captive  is  a  kind  of  dishonour.  But  look,  here 
lias  been  quite  a  different  kind  of  struggle  :  the  adverse 
power  has  been  more  orderly,  and  has  fought  the  pure  crystal 
in  ranks  as  firm  as  its  own.  This  is  not  mere  rage  and  im- 
pediment of  crowded  evil :  here  is  a  disciplined  hostility ; 
army  against  army. 

Lily.  Oh,  but  this  is  much  more  beautiful ! 

L.  Yes,  for  both  the  elements  have  true  virtue  in  them ;  it 
is  a  pity  they  are  at  war,  but  they  war  grandly. 

Mary.  But  is  this  the  same  clay  as  in  the  other  crystal  ? 

L.  I  used  the  word  clay  for  shortness.  In  both,  the  enemy 
is  really  limestone  ;  but  in  the  first,  disordered,  and  mixed 
with  true  clay  ;  while,  here,  it  is  nearly  pure,  and  crystallises 
into  its  own  primitive  form,  the  oblique  six-sided  one,  which 
you  know :  and  out  of  these  it  makes  regiments  ;  and  then 


7i 


THE  ETHICS  OF  THE  BUST. 


squares  of  the  regiments,  and  so  charges  the  rock  crystal 
literally  in  square  against  column. 

Isabel.  Please,  please,  let  me  see.  And  what  does  the 
rock  crystal  do  ? 

L.  The  rock  crystal  seems  able  to  do  nothing.  The  calcite 
cuts  it  through  at  every  charge.  Look  here, — and  here  ! 
The  loveliest  crystal  in  the  whole  group  is  hewn  fairly  into 
two  pieces. 

Isabel.  Oh,  dear ;  but  is  the  calcite  harder  than  the  crys- 
tal then? 

L.  No,  softer.    Very  much  softer. 

Mary.  But  then,  how  can  it  possibly  cut  the  crystal  ? 

L.  It  did  not  really  cut  it,  though  it  passes  through  it. 
The  two  were  formed  together,  as  I  told  you  ;  but  no  one 
knows  how.  Still,  it  is  strange  that  this  hard  quartz  has  in 
all  cases  a  good-natured  way  with  it,  of  yielding  to  every- 
thing else.  All  sorts  of  soft  things  make  nests  for  themselves 
in  it ;  and  it  never  makes  a  nest  for  itself  in  anything.  It 
has  all  the  rough  outside  work  ;  and  every  sort  of  cowardly 
and  weak  mineral  can  shelter  itself  within  it.  Look  ;  these 
are  hexagonal  plates  of  mica  ;  if  they  were  outside  of  this 
crystal  they  would  break,  like  burnt  paper  ;  but  they  are 
inside  of  it, — nothing  can  hurt  them, — the  crystal  has  taken 
them  into  its  very  heart,  keeping  all  their  delicate  edges  as 
sharp  as  if  they  were  under  water,  instead  of  bathed  in  rock. 
Here  is  a  piece  of  branched  silver  :  you  can  bend  it  with  a 
touch  of  your  finger,  but  the  stamp  of  its  every  fibre  is  on 
the  rock  in  which  it  lay,  as  if  the  quartz  had  been  as  soft  as 
wool. 

Lily.  Oh,  the  good,  good  quartz  !  But  does  it  never  get 
inside  of  anything  ? 

L.  As  it  is  a  little  Irish  girl  who  asks,  I  may  perhaps  an- 
swer, without  being  laughed  at,  that  it  gets  inside  of  itself 
sometimes.  Bat  I  don't  remember  seeing  quartz  make  a  nest 
for  itself  in  anything  else. 

Isabel.  Please,  there  was  something  I  heard  you  talking 
about,  last  term,  with  Miss  Mary.  I  was  at  my  lessons,  but 
I  heard  something  about  nests  ;  and  I  thought  it  was  birds' 


CRYSTAL  QUARRELS. 


75 


nests  ;  and  I  couldn't  help  listening  ;  and  then,  I  remem- 
ber, it  was  about  '  nests  of  quartz  in  granite.'  I  remember 
because  I  was  so  disappointed  ! 

L.  Yes,  mousie,  you  remember  quite  rightly  ;  but  I  can'* 
tell  you  about  those  nests  to-day,  nor  perhaps  to-morrow : 
but  there's  no  contradiction  between  my  saying  then,  and 
now  ;  I  will  show  you  that  there  is  not,  some  day.  Will  you 
trust  me  meanwhile  ? 

Isabel.  Won't  I ! 

L.  Well,  then,  look,  lastly,  at  this  piece  of  courtesy  in 
quartz  ;  it  is  on  a  small  scale,  but  wonderfully  pretty.  Here 
is  nobly  born  quartz  living  with  a  green  mineral,  called  epi- 
dote  ;  and  they  are  immense  friends.  Now,  you  see,  a  com- 
paratively large  and  strong  quartz -crystal,  and  a  very  weak 
and  slender  little  one  of  epidote,  have  begun  to  grow,  close 
by  each  other,  and  sloping  unluckily  towards  each  other,  so 
that  they  at  last  meet.  They  cannot  go  on  growing  togeth- 
er ;  the  quartz  crystal  is  five  times  as  thick,  and  more  than 
twenty  times  as  strong,*  as  the  epidote  ;  but  he  stops  at 
once,  just  in  the  very  crowning  moment  of  his  life,  when  he 
is  building  his  own  summit !  He  lets  the  pale  little  film  of 
epidote  grow  right  past  him  ;  stopping  his  own  summit  for 
it ;  and  he  never  himself  grows  any  more. 

Lily  (after  some  silence  of  wonder).  But  is  the  quartz  never 
wicked  then  ? 

L.  Yes,  but  the  wickedest  quartz  seems  good-natured,  com- 
pared to  other  things.  Here  are  two  very  characteristic  ex- 
amples ;  one  is  good  quartz,  living  with  good  pearlspar,  and 
the  other,  wicked  quartz,  living  with  wicked  pearlspar.  In 
both,  the  quartz  yields  to  the  soft  carbonate  of  iron  :  but,  in 
the  first  place,  the  iron  takes  only  what  it  needs  of  room  ;  and 
is  inserted  into  the  planes  of  the  rock  crystal  with  such  pre- 
cision, that  you  must  break  it  away  before  you  can  tell 
whether  it  really  penetrates  the  quartz  or  not ;  wrhile  the 
crystals  of  iron  are  perfectly  formed,  and  have  a  lovely  bloom 
on  their  surface  besides.    But  here,  when  the  two  minerals 

*  Quartz  is  not  much  harder  than  epidote ;  the  strength  is  only  sup 
posed  to  be  in  some  proportion  to  the  squares  of  the  diameters. 


76 


THE  ETHICS  OF  THE  DUST. 


quarrel,  the  unhappy  quartz  has  all  its  surfaces  jagged  and 
torn  to  pieces  ;  and  there  is  not  a  single  iron  crystal  whose 
shape  you  can  completely  trace.  But  the  quartz  has  the  worst 
of  it,  in  both  instances. 

Violet.  Might  we  look  at  that  piece  of  broken  quartz  again, 
with  the  weak  little  film  across  it  ?  it  seems  such  a  strange 
lovely  thing,  like  the  self-sacrifice  of  a  human  being. 

L.  The  self  sacrifice  of  a  human  being  is  not  a  lovely  thing, 
Violet.  It  is  often  a  necessary  and  noble  thing  ;  but  no  form 
nor  degree  of  suicide  can  be  ever  lovely. 

Violet.  Bat  self-sacrifice  is  not  suicide ! 

L.  What  is  it  then  ? 

Violet.  Giving  up  one's  self  for  another. 

L.  Well ;  and  what  do  you  mean  by  -  giving  up  one's  self?' 

Violet.  Giving  up  one's  tastes,  one's  feelings,  one's  time, 
one's  happiness,  and  so  on,  to  make  others  happy. 

L.  I  hope  you  will  never  marry  anybody,  Violet,  who  ex- 
pects you  to  make  him  happy  in  that  way. 

Violet  (hesitating).  In  what  way  ? 

L.  By  giving  up  your  tastes,  and  sacrificing  your  feelings, 
and  happiness. 

Violet.  No,  no,  I  don't  mean  that ;  but  you  know,  for  other 
people,  one  must. 

L.  For  people  who  don't  love  you,  and  whom  you  know 
nothing  about  ?  Be  it  so  ;  but  how  does  this  '  giving  up '  dif- 
fer from  suicide  then  ? 

Violet.  Why,  giving  up  one's  pleasures  is  not  killing  one's 
self  ? 

L.  Giving  up  wrong  pleasure  is  not ;  neither  is  it  self-sacri- 
fice, but  self-culture.  But  giving  up  right  pleasure  is.  If 
you  surrender  the  pleasure  of  walking,  your  foot  will  wither ; 
you  may  as  well  cut  it  off :  if  you  surrender  the  pleasure  of 
seeing,  your  eyes  will  soon  be  unable  to  bear  the  light ;  you 
may  as  well  pluck  them  out.  And  to  maim  yourself  is  partly 
to  kill  yourself.  Do  but  go  on  maiming,  and  you  will  soon 
slay. 

Violet.  But  why  do  you  make  me  think  of  that  verse  ther, 
%bout  the  foot  and  the  eye  ? 


CRYSTAL  QUARRELS. 


77 


L.  You  are  indeed  commanded  to  cut  off  and  to  pluck  out, 
if  foot  or  eye  offend  you  ;  but  why  should  they  offend  you  ? 

Violet.  I  don't  know  ;  I  never  quite  understood  that. 

L.  "Yet  it  is  a  sharp  order  ;  one  needing  to  be  well  under- 
stood if  it  is  to  be  well  obeyed  !  When  Helen  sprained  her 
ancle  the  other  day,  you  saw  how  strongly  it  had  to  be  band- 
aged :  that  is  to  say,  prevented  from  all  work,  to  recover  it. 
But  the  bandage  was  not  £  lovely.' 

Violet.  No,  indeed. 

L.  And  if  her  foot  had  been  crushed,  or  diseased,  or  snake- 
bitten,  instead  of  sprained,  it  might  have  been  needful  to  cut 
it  off.    But  the  amputation  would  not  have  been  '  lovely.' 

Violet.  No. 

L.  Well,  if  eye  and  foot  are  dead  already,  and  betray  you 
— if  the  light  that  is  in  you  be  darkness,  and  your  feet  run 
into  mischief,  or  are  taken  in  the  snare, — it  is  indeed  time 
to  pluck  out,  and  cut  off,  I  think  :  but,  so  crippled,  you  can 
never  be  what  you  might  have  been  otherwise.  You  enter 
into  life,  at  best,  halt  or  maimed ;  and  the  sacrifice  is  not 
beautiful,  though  necessary. 

Violet  {after  a  pause).  But  when  one  sacrifices  one's  self 
for  others  ? 

L.  Why  not  rather  others  for  you  ? 

Violet.  Oh  !  but  I  couldn't  bear  that. 

L.  Then  why  should  they  bear  it  ? 

Dora  [bursting  in,  indignant).  And  Thermopylae,  and  Pro- 
tesilaus,  and  Marcus  Curtius,  and  Arnold  de  Winkelried,  and 
Iphigenia,  and  Jephthah's  daughter  ? 

L.  (sustaining  the  indignation  unmoved).  And  the  Samaritan 
woman's  son  ? 

Dora.  Which  Samaritan  woman's? 

L.  Bead  2  Kings  vi.  29. 

Dora  (obeys).  How  horrid !  As  if  we  meant  anything  like 
that ! 

L.  You  don't  seem  to  me  to  know  in  the  least  what  you  do 
mean,  children.  What  practical  difference  is  there  between 
•  that,'  and  what  you  are  talking  about  ?  The  Samaritan  chil- 
dren had  no  voice  of  their  own  in  the  business,  it  is  true  ;  but 


78 


THE  ETHICS  OF  THE  DUST. 


neither  had  Iphigenia :  the  Greek  girl  was  certainly  neithei 
boiled,  nor  eaten  ;  but  that  only  makes  a  difference  in  the 
dramatic  effect  ;  not  in  the  principle. 

Dora  (biting  her  lip).  Well,  then,  tell  us  what  we  ought  to 
mean.  As  if  you  didn't  teach  it  all  to  us,  and  mean  it  your- 
self, at  this  moment,  more  than  we  do,  if  you  wouldn't  be 
tiresome  ! 

L.  I  mean,  and  have  always  meant,  simply  this,  Dora ; — > 
that  the  will  of  God  respecting  us  is  that  we  shall  live  by  each 
other's  happiness,  and  life  ;  not  by  each  other's  misery,  or 
death.  I  made  you  read  that  verse  which  so  shocked  you  just 
now,  because  the  relations  of  parent  and  child  are  typical  of 
all  beautiful  human  help.  A  child  may  have  to  die  for  its 
parents  ;  but  the  purpose  of  Heaven  is  that  it  shall  rather  live 
for  them  ; — that,  not  by  its  sacrifice,  but  by  its  strength,  its 
joy,  its  force  of  being,  it  shall  be  to  them  renewal  of  strength  ; 
and  as  the  arrow  in  the  hand  of  the  giant.  So  it  is  in  all 
other  right  relations.  Men  help  each  other  by  their  joy,  not 
by  their  sorrow.  They  are  not  intended  to  slay  themselves 
for  each  other,  but  to  strengthen  themselves  for  each  other. 
And  among  the  many  apparently  beautiful  things  which  turn, 
through  mistaken  use,  to  utter  evil,  I  am  not  sure  but  that 
the  thoughtlessly  meek  and  self-sacrificing  spirit  of  good  men 
must  be  named  as  one  of  the  fatallest.  They  have  so  often 
been  taught  that  there  is  a  virtue  in  mere  suffering,  as  such  ; 
and  foolishly  to  hope  that  good  may  be  brought  by  Heaven 
out  of  all  on  which  Heaven  itself  has  set  the  stamp  of  evil, 
that  we  may  avoid  it, — that  they  accept  pain  and  defeat  as  if 
these  were  their  appointed  portion  ;  never  understanding  that 
their  defeat  is  not  the  less  to  be  mourned  because  it  is  more 
fatal  to  their  enemies  than  to  them.  The  one  thing  that  a 
good  man  has  to  do,  and  to  see  done,  is  justice  ;  he  is  neither 
to  slay  himself  nor  others  causelessly  :  so  far  from  denying 
himself,  since  he  is  pleased  by  good,  he  is  to  do  his  utmost  to 
get  his  pleasure  accomplished.  And  I  only  wish  there  were 
strength,  fidelity,  and  sense  enough,  among  the  good  English- 
men of  this  day,  to  render  it  possible  for  them  to  band  to- 
gether in  a  vowed  brotherhood,  to  enforce,  by  strength  of 


CRYSTAL  QUARRELS. 


79 


heart  and  hand,  the  doing  of  human  justice  among  all  who 
came  within  their  sphere.  And  finally,  for  your  own  teach- 
ing, observe,  although  there  may  be  need  for  much  self-sacri- 
fice and  self-denial  in  the  correction  of  faults  of  character, 
the  moment  the  character  is  formed,  the  self-denial  ceases. 
Nothing  is  really  well  done,  which  it  costs  you  pain  to  do. 

Violet.  But  surely,  sir,  you  are  always  pleased  with  us 
when  we  try  to  please  others,  and  not  ourselves  ? 

L.  My  dear  child,  in  the  daily  course  and  discipline  of  right 
life,  we  must  continually  and  reciprocally  submit  and  sur- 
render in  all  kind  and  courteous  and  affectionate  ways  :  and 
these  submissions  and  ministries  to  each  other,  of  which  you 
all  know  (none  better)  the  practice  and  the  preciousness,  are 
as  good  for  the  yielder  as  the  receiver  :  they  strengthen  and 
perfect  as  much  as  they  soften  and  refine.  But  the  real  sacri- 
fice of  all  our  strength,  or  life,  or  happiness  to  others  (though 
it  may  be  needed,  and  though  all  brave  creatures  hold  their 
lives  in  their  hand,  to  be  given,  when  such  need  comes,  as 
frankly  as  a  soldier  gives  his  life  in  battle),  is  yet  always  a 
mournful  and  momentary  necessity  ;  not  the  fulfilment  of  the 
continuous  law  of  being.  Self-sacrifice  which  is  sought  after, 
and  triumphed  in,  is  usually  foolish  ;  and  calamitous  in  its 
issue  :  and  by  the  sentimental  proclamation  and  pursuit  of  it, 
good  people  have  not  only  made  most  of  their  own  lives  use- 
less, but  the  whole  framework  of  their  religion  so  hollow, 
that  at  this  moment,  while  the  English  nation,  with  its  lips, 
pretends  to  teach  every  man  to  •  love  his  neighbour  as  him- 
self,' with  its  hands  and  feet  it  clutches  and  tramples  like  a 
wild  beast ;  and  practically  lives,  every  soul  of  it  that  can,  on 
other  people's  labour.  Briefly,  the  constant  duty  of  every  man 
to  his  fellows  is  to  ascertain  his  own  powers  and  special  gifts  ; 
and  to  strengthen  them  for  the  help  of  others.  Do  you  think 
Titian  would  have  helped  the  wrorld  better  by  denying  him- 
self,  and  not  painting  ;  or  Casella  by  denying  himself,  and  not 
singing  ?  The  real  virtue  is  to  be  ready  to  sing  the  moment 
people  ask  us  ;  as  he  was,  even  in  purgatory.  The  very  word 
'virtue'  means  not  'conduct'  but  'strength,' vital  energy  in 
the  heart.    Were  not  you  reading  about  that  group  of  words 


80 


THE  ETHICS  OF  THE  DUST. 


beginning  with  V, — vital,  virtuous,  vigorous,  and  so  on, — in 
Max  Muller,  the  other  day,  Sibyl  ?  Can't  you  tell  the  othera 
about  it  ? 

Sibyl.  No,  I  can't ;  will  you  tell  us,  please  ? 

L.  Not  now,  it  is  too  late.  Come  to  me  some  idle  time 
to-morrow,  and  111  tell  you  about  it,  if  all's  well.  But  the 
gist  of  it  is,  children,  that  you  should  at  least  know  two  Latin 
words  ;  recollect  that  '  mors '  means  death  and  delaying  ;  and 
6  vita  9  means  life  and  growing  :  and  try  always,  not  to  mor- 
tify yourselves,  but  to  vivify  yourselves. 

Violet.  But,  then,  are  we  not  to  mortify  our  earthly  affec- 
tions? and  surely  we  are  to  sacrifice  ourselves,  at  least  in 
God's  service,  if  not  in  man's  ? 

L.  Keally,  Violet,  we  are  getting  too  serious.  I've  given 
you  enough  ethics  for  one  talk,  I  think  !  Do  let  us  have  a 
little  play.  Lily,  what  were  you  so  busy  about,  at  the  ant-hill 
in  the  wood,  this  morning  ? 

Lily.  Oh,  it  was  the  ants  who  were  busy,  not  I ;  I  waa 
only  trying  to  help  them  a  little. 

L.  And  they  wouldn't  be  helped,  I  suppose  ? 

Lily.  No,  indeed.  I  can't  think  why  ants  are  always  so 
tiresome,  when  one  tries  to  help  them  !  They  were  carrying 
bits  of  stick,  as  fast  as  they  could,  through  a  piece  of  grass  ; 
and  pulling  and  pushing,  so  hard ;  and  tumbling  over  and 
over, — it  made  one  quite  pity  them  ;  so  I  took  some  of  the 
bits  of  stick,  and  carried  them  forward  a  little,  where  I 
thought  they  wanted  to  put  them  ;  but  instead  of  being 
pleased,  they  left  them  directly,  and  ran  about  looking  quite 
angry  and  frightened  ;  and  at  last  ever  so  many  of  them  got 
up  my  sleeves,  and  bit  me  all  over,  and  I  had  to  come  away. 

L.  I  couldn't  think  what  you  were  about.  I  saw  your 
French  grammar  lying  on  the  grass  behind  you,  and  thought 
perhaps  you  had  gone  to  ask  the  ants  to  hear  you  a  French 
verb. 

Isabel.  Ah  !  but  you  didn't,  though ! 

L.  Why  not,  Isabel  ?  I  knew,  well  enough,  Lily  couldn't 
xearn  that  verb  by  herself. 

Isabel.  No  ;  but  the  ants  couldn't  help  her. 


CRYSTAL  QUARRELS. 


81 


L.  Are  you  sure  the  ants  could  not  have  helped  you,  Lily  ? 
Lily  {thinking).  I  ought  to  have  learned  something  from 
them,  perhaps. 

L.  But  none  of  them  left  their  sticks  to  help  you  through 
the  irregular  verb  ? 

Lily.  No,  indeed.    (Laughing,  with  some  others.) 

L.  What  are  you  laughing  at,  children  ?  I  cannot  see  why 
the  ants  should  not  have  left  their  tasks  to  help  Lily  in  her's, 
■ — since  here  is  Violet  thinking  she  ought  to  leave  her  tasks, 
to  help  God  in  His.  Perhaps,  however,  she  takes  Lily's  more 
modest  view,  and  thinks  only  that  '  He  ought  to  learn  some- 
thing from  her.' 

(Tears  in  Violet's  eyes.) 

Dora  (scarlet).    It's  too  bad — it's  a  shame  : — poor  Violet ! 

L.  My  dear  children,  there's  no  reason  why  one  should  be 
ao  red,  and  the  other  so  pale,  merely  because  you  are  made 
for  a  moment  to  feel  the  absurdity  of  a  phrase  which  you 
have  been  taught  to  use,  in  common  with  half  the  religious 
world.  There  is  but  one  way  in  which  man  can  ever  help 
God — that  is,  by  letting  God  help  him  :  and  there  is  no  way 
in  which  his  name  is  more  guiltily  taken  in  vain,  than  by  call- 
ing the  abandonment  of  our  own  work,  the  performance  of 
His. 

God  is  a  kind  Father.  He  sets  us  all  in  the  places  where 
He  wishes  us  to  be  employed  ;  and  that  employment  is  truly 
'  our  Father's  business/  He  chooses  work  for  every  creature 
which  will  be  delightful  to  them,  if  they  do  it  simply  and 
humbly.  He  gives  us  always  strength  enough,  and  sense 
enough,  for  what  He  wants  us  to  do  ;  if  we  either  tire  our- 
selves or  puzzle  ourselves,  it  is  our  own  fault.  And  we  may 
always  be  sure,  whatever  we  are  doing,  that  we  cannot  be 
pleasing  Him,  if  wre  are  not  happy  ourselves.  Now,  away 
with  you,  children  ;  and  be  as  happy  as  you  can.  And  when 
you  cannot,  at  least  don't  plume  yourselves  upon  pouting. 


LECTURE  VII. 


HOME  VIRTUES. 
By  the  fireside,  in  the  Drawing-room.  Evening. 

Ijora.  Now,  the  curtains  are  drawn,  and  the  fire's  bright 
and  here's  your  arm-chair—and  you're  to  tell  us  all  about  what 
you  promised. 

L.  All  about  what  ? 

Doha.  All  about  virtue. 

Kathleen.  Yes,  and  about  the  words  that  begin  with  V. 
L.  I  heard  you  singing  about  a  word  that  begins  with  V, 
in  the  playground,  this  morning,  Miss  Katie. 
Kathleen.  Me  singing? 
May.  Oh  tell  us — tell  us. 
L.  '  Vilikens  and  his  ' 

Kathleen  {stopping  his  mouth).    Oh  !  please  don't.  Where 
were  you  ? 

Isabel.  I'm  sure  I  wish  I  had  known- where  he  was!  We 
lost  him  among  the  rhododendrons,  and  I  don't  know  where 
he  got  to  ;  oh,  you  naughty — naughty — (climbs  on  his  knee). 

Doha.  Now,  Isabel,  we  really  want  to  talk. 

L.  /.don't. 

Dora.  Oh,  but  you  must.    You  promised,  you  know. 
L.  Yes,  if  all  was  well ;  but  ail's  ill.    I'm  tired,  and  cross  ; 
and  I  won't. 

Dora.  You're  not  a  bit  tired,  and  you're  not  crosser  than 
two  sticks  ;  and  we'll  make  you  talk,  if  you  were  crosser  than  . 
six.    Come  here,  Egypt ;  and  get  on  the  other  side  of  him. 

(Egypt  takes  up  a  commanding  position  near  the  hearth- 
brush.) 

Dora  (reviewing  her  forces).    Now,  Lily,  come  and  sit  on 
the  rug  in  front. 

(Lily  does  as  she  is  bid.) 


HOME  VIRTUES. 


S3 


L.  {seeing  he  has  no  chance  against  the  odds.)  Well,  well ; 
but  I'm  really  tired.  Go  and  dance  a  little,  first ;  and  let  me 
think. 

Dora.  No  ;  you  mustn't  think.  You  will  be  wanting  to 
make  us  think  next ;  that  will  be  tiresome. 

L.  Well,  go  and  dance  first,  to  get  quit  of  thinking  ;  and 
then  I'll  talk  as  long  as  you  like. 

Dora.  Oh,  but  we  can't  dance  to-night.  There  isn't  time  ; 
and  we  wan't  to  hear  about  virtue. 

L.  Let  me  see  a  little  of  it  first.  Dancing  is  the  first  of 
girl's  virtues. 

Egypt.  Indeed  !  And  the  second  ? 

L.  Dressing. 

Egypt.  Now,  you  needn't  say  that !  I  mended  that  tear  the 
first  thing  before  breakfast  this  morning. 

L.  I  cannot  otherwise  express  the  ethical  principle,  Egypt  ; 
wThether  you  have  mended  your  gown  or  not. 

Dora.  Now  don't  be  tiresome.  We  really  must  hear  about 
virtue,  please  ;  seriously. 

L.  Well.    I'm  telling  you  about  it,  as  fast  as  I  can. 

DoRx\.  What !  the  first  of  girls'  virtues  is  dancing  ? 

L.  More  accurately,  it  is  wishing  to  dance,  and  not  wishing 
to  tease,  nor  hear  about  virtue. 

Dora  (to  Egypt).  Isn't  he  cross? 

Egypt.  How  many  balls  must  we  go  to  in  the  season,  to  be 
perfectly  virtuous  ? 

L.  As  many  as  you  can  without  losing  your  colour.  But 
I  did  not  say  you  should  wish  to  go  to  balls.  I  said  you 
should  be  always  wanting  to  dance. 

Egypt.  So  we  do  ;  but  everybody  says  it  is  very  wTong. 

L.  WThy,  Egypt,  I  thought — 

*  There  was  a  lady  once, 

That  would  not  be  a  queen, — that  would  she  not, 
For  all  the  mud  in  Egypt.' 

You  were  complaining  the  other  day  of  having  to  go  out  a 
great  deal  of  tener  than  you  liked, 


THE  ETHICS  OF  THE  DUST. 


Egypt.  Yes,  so  I  was  ;  but  then,  it  isn't  to  dance.  There's 

no  room  to  dance  :  it's — (Pausing  to  consider  what  it  is  for). 

L.  It  is  only  to  be  seen,  I  suppose.  Well,  there's  no  harm 
in  that.    Girls  ought  to  like  to  be  seen. 

Dora  [her  eyes  flashing).  Now,  you  don't  mean  that ;  and 
you're  too  provoking  ;  and  we  won't  dance  again,  for  a  monthc 

L.  It  will  answer  every  purpose  of  revenge,  Dora,  if  you 
only  banish  me  to  the  library  ;  and  dance  by  yourselves  :  bui 
I  don't  think  Jessie  and  Lily  will  agree  to  that.  You  like  m< 
to  see  you  dancing,  don't  you  Lily  ? 

Lily.  Yes,  certainly, — when  we  do  it  rightly. 

L.  And  besides,  Miss  Dora,  if  young  ladies  really  do  not 
want  to  be  seen,  they  should  take  care  not  to  let  their  eyes 
flash  when  they  dislike  what  people  say  :  and,  more  than  that, 
it  is  all  nonsense  from  beginning  to  end,  about  not  want- 
ing to  be  seen.  I  don't  know  any  more  tiresome  flower  in  the 
borders  than  your  especially  ( modest '  snowdrop  ;  which  one 
always  has  to  stoop  down  and  take  all  sorts  of  tiresome  trou- 
ble with,  and  nearly  break  its  poor  little  head  off,  before  you 
can  see  it  ;  and  then,  half  of  it  is  not  worth  seeing.  Girls 
should  be  like  daisies  ;  nice  and  white,  with  an  edge  of  red, 
if  you  look  close  ;  making  the  ground  bright  wherever  they 
are  ;  knowing  simply  and  quietly  that  they  do  it,  and  are 
meant  to  do  it,  and  that  it  would  be  very  wrong  if  they  didn't 
do  it.  Not  want  to  be  seen,  indeed  !  How  long  were  you  in 
doing  your  back  hair,  this  afternoon,  Jessie  ? 

(Jessie  not  immediately  answering,  Doha  comes  to  her  assist* 
ance.) 

Dora.    Not  above  three-quarters  of  an  hour,  I  think,  Jess? 

Jessie  (putting  her  finger  up).  Now,  Dorothy,  you  needn't 
talk,  you  know  ! 

L.  I  know  she  needn't,  Jessie  ;  I  shall  ask  her  about  those 
dark  plaits  presently.  (Dora  looks  round  to  see  if  there  is  any 
way  open  for  retreat.)  But  never  mind  ;  it  was  worth  the 
time,  whatever  it  was  ;  and  nobody  will  ever  mistake  that 
golden  wreath  for  a  chignon  :  but  if  you  don't  want  it  to  be 
seen,  you  had  better  wear  a  cap. 


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85 


Jessie.  Ah,  now,  are  you  really  going  to  do  nothing  but  ■ 
play  ?    And  we  all  have  been  thinking,  and  thinking,  all  day  ; 
and  hoping  you  would  tell  us  things  ;  and  now —  ! 

L.  And  now  I  am  telling  you  things,  and  true  things,  and 
things  good  for  you  ;  and  you  won't  believe  me.  You  might 
as  well  have  let  me  go  to  sleep  at  once,  as  I  wanted  to. 

{Endeavours  again  to  make  himself  comfortable.) 

Isabel.  Oh,  no,  no,  you  sha'n't  go  to  sleep,  you  naughty — i 
Kathleen,  come  here. 

L.  {knowing  what  he  has  to  expect  ^Kathleen  comes).  Get 
away,  Isabel,  you're  too  heavy.  {Sitting  up.)  What  have  I 
been  saying  ? 

Dora.  I  do  believe  he  has  been  asleep  all  the  time !  You 
never  heard  anything  like  the  things  you've  been  saying. 

L.  Perhaps  not.  If  you  have  heard  them,  and  anything 
like  them,  it  is  all  I  want 

Egypt.  Yes,  but  we  don't  understand,  and  you  know  wo 
don't ;  and  we  want  to. 

L.  What  did  I  say  first  ? 

Dora.  That  the  first  virtue  of  girls  was  wanting  to  go  to 
balls. 

L.  I  said  nothing  of  the  kind. 

Jessie.  '  Always  wanting  to  dance/  you  said. 

L.  Yes,  and  that's  true.  Their  first  virtue  is  to  be  intensely 
happy  ; — so  happy  that  they  don't  know  what  to  do  with  them- 
selves for  happiness, — and  dance,  instead  of  walking.  Don't 
you  recollect  'Louisa,' 

'  No  fountain  from  a  rocky  cave 
E'er  tripped  with  foot  so  free  ; 
She  seemed  as  happy  as  a  wave 
That  dances  on  the  sea.' 

A  girl  is  always  like  that,  when  everything's  right  with  her, 
Violet.  But,  surely,  one  must  be  sad  sometimes  ? 
L.  Yes,  Violet ;  and  dull  sometimes,  and  stupid  sometimes, 

and  cross  sometimes.    What  must  be,  must  5  but  it  is  always 


86 


THE  ETHICS  OF  THE  DUST. 


either  our  own  fault,  or  somebody  else's.  The  last  and  worst 
thing  that  can  be  said  of  a  nation  is,  that  it  has  made  its 
young  girls  sad,  and  weary. 

May.  But  I  am  sure  I  have  heard  a  great  many  good  people 
speak  against  dancing  ? 

L.  Yes,  May  ;  but  it  does  not  follow  they  were  wise  as  well 
as  good.  I  suppose  they  think  Jeremiah  liked  better  to  have 
to  write  Lamentations  for  his  people,  than  to  have  to  write 
that  promise  for  them,  which  everybody  seems  to  hurry  past, 
that  they  may  get  on  quickly  to  the  verse  about  Eachel  weep- 
ing for  her  children  ;  though  the  verse  they  pass  is  the  counter- 
blessing  to  that  one  :  '  Then  shall  the  virgin  rejoice  in  the 
dance  ;  and  both  young  men  and  old  together ;  and  I  will 
turn  their  mourning  into  joy.5 

(The  children  get  very  serious,  but  look  at  each  other,  as  if 
pleased.) 

Mary.  They  understand  now  :  but,  do  you  know  what  you 
said  next? 

L.  Yes  ;  I  was  not  more  than  half  asleep.  I  said  their  sec- 
oncl  virtue  was  dressing. 

Mary.  Well !  what  did  you  mean  by  that  ? 
L.  What  do  you  mean  by  dressing? 
Mary.  Wearing  fine  clothes. 

L.  Ah  !  there's  the  mistake.  /  mean  wearing  plain  ones. 
.  Mary.  Yes,  I  daresay  !  but  that's  not  what  girls  understand 
by  dressing,  you  know. 

L.  I  can't  help  that.  If  they  understand  by  dressing,  buy- 
ing dresses,  perhaps  they  also  understand  by  drawing,  buying 
pictures.  But  when  I  hear  them  say  they  can  draw,  I  under- 
stand that  they  can  make  a  drawing  ;  and  when  I  hear  them 
say  they  can  dress,  I  understand  that  they  can  make  a  dress 
and — which  is  quite  as  difficult — wear  one. 

Dora.  I'm  not  sure  about  the  making  ;  for  the  wearing,  we 
can  all  wear  them— out,  before  anybody  expects  it. 

Egypt  (aside,  to  L ,  piteously).  Indeed  I  have  mended  that 
torn  flounce  quite  neatly  ;  look  if  I  haven't ! 

L.  (aside,  to  Egypt).  All  right;  don't  be  afraid.    (Aloud  to 


HOME  VIRTUES, 


87 


Dora.)  Yes,  doubtless  ;  but  you  know  that  is  only  a  slow  way 
of  wwdressing. 

Dora.  Then,  we  are  all  to  learn  dress-making,  are  we  ? 

L.  Yes  ;  and  always  to  dress  yourselves  beautifully — not 
finely,  unless  on  occasion  ;  but  then  very  finely  and  beauti- 
fully too.  Also,  you  are  to  dress  as  many  other  people  as  you 
can  ;  and  to  teach  them  how  to  dress,  if  they  don't  know  ; 
and  to  consider  every  ill-dressed  woman  or  child  whom 
you  see  anywhere,  as  a  personal  disgrace  ;  and  to  get  at  them, 
somehow,  until  everybody  is  as  beautifully  dressed  as  birds. 

{Silence ;  the  children  drawing  their  breaths  hard,  as  if 
they  had  come  from  under  a  shower  bath.) 

L  (seeing  objections  begin  to  express  themselves  in  the  eyes). 
Now  you  needn't  say  you  can't ;  for  you  can  :  and  it's  what 
you  were  meant  to  do,  always  ;  and  to  dress  your  houses,  and 
your  gardens,  too  ;  and  to  do  very  little  else,  I  believe,  ex- 
cept singing  ;  and  dancing,  as  we  said,  of  course  ;  and— one 
thing  more. 

Dora.  Our  third  and  last  virtue,  I  suppose  ? 

L.  Yes  ;  on  Violet's  system  of  triplicities. 

Dora.  Well,  we  are  prepared  for  anything  now.  What  is  it  ? 

L.  Cooking. 

Dora.  Cardinal,  indeed  !  If  only  Beatrice  were  here  with 
her  seven  handmaids,  that  she  might  see  what  a  fine  eighth 
we  had  found  for  her ! 

Mary.  And  the  interpretation  ?  What  does  '  cooking  ■  mean  ? 

L.  It  means  the  knowledge  of  Medea,  and  of  Circe,  and  of 
Calypso,  and  of  Helen,  and  of  Eebekah,  and  of  the  Queen  of 
Sheba.  It  means  the  knowledge  of  all  herbs,  and  fruits,  and 
balms,  and  spices  ;  and  of  all  that  is  healing  and  sweet  in 
fields  and  groves,  and  savoury  in  meats  ;  it  means  careful- 
ness, and  inventiveness,  and  watchfulness,  and  willingness, 
and  readiness  of  appliance  ;  it  means  the  economy  of  your 
great-grandmothers,  and  the  science  of  modern  chemists  ;  it 
means  much  tasting,  and  no  wasting  ;  it  means  English 
thoroughness,  and  French  art,  and  Arabian  hospitality ;  and 
it  means,  in  fine,  that  you  are  to  be  perfectly  and  always, 


ss 


THE  ETHICS  OF  THE  DUST. 


'  ladies ' — *  loaf-givers ; '  and,  as  you  are  to  see,  imperatively^ 
that  everybody  has  something  pretty  to  put  on, — so  you  ar<§ 
to  see,  yet  more  imperatively,  that  everybody  has  something 
nice  to  eat. 

{Another  pause,  and  long  drawn  breath.) 

Dora  (slowly  recovering  herself)  to  Egypt.  We  had  bettei 
have  let  him  go  to  sleep,  I  think,  after  all ! 

L.  You  had  better  let  the  younger  ones  go  to  sleep  now : 
for  I  haven't  half  done. 

Isabel  (panic-struck).  Oh  !  please,  please  !  just  one  quarter 
of  an  hour. 

L.  No,  Isabel ;  I  cannot  say  what  I've  got  to  say,  in  a 
quarter  of  an  hour ;  and  it  is  too  hard  for  you,  besides  : — 
you  would  be  lying  awake,  and  trying  to  make  it  out,  half 
the  night.    That  will  never  do. 

Isabel.  Oh,  please  ! 

L.  It  would  please  me  exceedingly,  mousie  :  but  there  are 
times  when  we  must  both  be  displeased  ;  mores  the  pity. 
Lily  may  stay  for  half  an  hour,  if  she  likes. 

Lily.  I  can't  ;  because  Isey  never  goes  to  sleep,  if  she  ia 
waiting  for  me  to  come. 

Isabel.  Oh,  yes,  Lily ;  I'll  go  to  sleep  to-night,  I  will,  in- 
deed. 

Lily.  Yes,  it's  very  likely,  Isey,  with  those  fine  round  eyes  ! 
(To  L.)  You'll  tell  me  something  of  what  you've  been  saying, 
to-morrow,  w7on't  you  ? 

L.  No,  I  won't,  Lily.  You  must  choose.  It's  only  in  Miss 
Edgeworth's  novels  that  one  can  do  right,  and  have  one's 
cake  and  sugar  afterwards,  as  well  (not  that  I  consider  the 
dilemma,  to-night,  so  grave). 

(Lily,  sighing,  takes  Isabel's  hand.) 
Yes,  Lily  dear,  it  will  be  better,  in  the  outcome  of  it,  so, 
than  if  you  were  to  hear  all  the  talks  that  ever  were  talked, 
$nd  all  the  stories  that  ever  were  told.    Good  night. 

(The  door  leading  to  the  condemned  cells  of  the  Dormitory 
closes  on  Lily,  Isabel,  Floerie,  and  other  diminutive 
and  submissive  victims.) 


HOME  VIRTUES. 


89 


Jessie  (after  a  ]Muse).  Why,  I  thought  you  were  so  fond 
of  Miss  Edgeworth  ! 

L.  So  I  am  ;  and  so  you  ought  all  to  be.  I  can  read  her 
over  and  over  again,  without  ever  tiring  ;  there's  no  one 
whose  every  page  is  so  full,  and  so  delightful ;  no  one  who 
brings  you  into  the  company  of  pleasanter  or  wiser  people  ; 
no  one  who  tells  you  more  truly  how  to  do  right.  And  it  is 
very  nice,  in  the  midst  of  a  wild  world,  to  have  the  very  ideal 
of  poetical  justice  done  always  to  one's  hand  : — to  have 
everybody  found  out,  who  tells  lies  ;  and  everybody  decorated 
with  a  red  riband,  who  doesn't ;  and  to  see  the  good  Laura, 
who  gave  away  her  half  sovereign,  receiving  a  grand  ovation 
from  an  entire  dinner  party  disturbed  for  the  purpose  ;  and 
poor,  dear,  little  Rosamond,  who  chooses  purple  jars  instead 
of  new  shoes,  left  at  last  without  either  her  shoes  or  her 
bottle.  But  it  isn't  life:  and,  in  the  way  children  might  easily 
understand  it,  it  isn't  morals. 

Jessie.  How  do  you  mean  we  might  understand  it  ? 

L.  You  might  think  Miss  Edgeworth  meant  that  the  right 
was  to  be  done  mainly  because  one  was  always  rewarded  for 
doing  it.  It  is  an  injustice  to  her  to  say  that  :  her  heroines 
always  do  right  simply  for  its  own  sake,  as  they  should  ;  and 
her  examples  of  conduct  and  motive  are  wholly  admirable. 
But  her  representation  of  events  is  false  and  misleading. 
Her  good  characters  never  are  brought  into  the  deadly  trial 
of  goodness, — the  doing  right,  and  suffering  for  it,  quite 
finally.  And  that  is  life,  as  God  arranges  it.  'Taking  up 
one's  cross '  does  not  at  all  mean  having  ovations  at  dinner 
parties,  and  being  put  over  everybody  else's  head. 

Dora.  But  what  does  it  mean  then  ?  That  is  just  what  we 
couldn't  understand,  when  you  were  telling  us  about  not 
sacrificing  ourselves,  yesterday. 

L.  My  dear,  it  means  simply  that  you  are  to  go  the  road 
which  you  see  to  be  the  straight  one  ;  carrying  whatever  you 
find  is  given  you  to  carry,  as  well  and  stoutly  as  you  can  ; 
without  making  faces,  or  calling  people  to  come  and  look  at 
you.  Above  all,  you  are  neither  to  load,  nor  unload,  your- 
self ;  nor  cut  your  cross  to  your  own  liking.    Some  people 


90 


THE  ETHICS  OF  THE  DUST. 


think  it  would  be  better  for  them  to  have  it  large  ;  and  many, 
that  they  could  carry  it  much  faster  if  it  were  small ;  and 
even  those  who  like  it  largest  are  usually  very  particular 
about  its  being  ornamental,  and  made  of  the  best  ebony.  But 
all  that  you  have  really  to  do  is  to  keep  your  back  as  straight 
as  you  can  ;  and  not  think  about  what  is  upon  it — above  all, 
not  to  boast  of  what  is  upon  it.  The  real  and  essential  mean- 
ing of  '  virtue '  is  in  that  straightness  of  back.  Yes  ;  you  may 
laugh,  children,  but  it  is.  You  know  I  was  to  tell  about  the 
words  that  began  with  V.  Sibyl,  what  does  *  virtue '  mean, 
literally  ? 

Sibyl.  Does  it  mean  courage  ? 

L.  Yes  ;  but  a  particular  kind  of  courage.  It  means  cour- 
age of  the  nerve  ;  vital  courage.  That  first  syllable  of  it,  if 
you  look  in  Max  Mtilier,  you  will  find  really  means  '  nerve,1 
and  from  it  come  '  vis,'  and  'vir/and  'virgin'  (through  vi- 
reo),  and  the  connected  word  'virga' — ca  rod  •  j — the  green 
rod,  or  springing  bough  of  a  tree,  being  the  type  of  perfect 
human  strength,  both  in  the  use  of  it  in  the  Mosaic  story, 
when  it  becomes  a  serpent,  or  strikes  the  rock  ;  or  when 
Aaron's  bears  its  almonds  ;  and  in  the  metaphorical  expres- 
sions, the  'Rod  out  of  the  stem  of  Jesse,'  and  the  'Man 
whose  name  is  the  Branch,'  and  so  on.  And  the  essential 
idea  of  real  virtue  is  that  of  a  vital  human  strength,  which 
instinctively,  constantly,  and  without  motive,  does  what  is 
right.  You  must  train  men  to  this  by  habit,  as  you  would 
the  branch  of  a  tree  ;  and  give  them  instincts  and  manners 
(or  morals)  of  purity,  justice,  kindness,  and  courage.  Once 
rightly  trained,  they  act  as  they  should,  irrespectively  of  all 
motive,  of  fear,  or  of  reward.  It  is  the  blackest  sign  of 
putrescence  in  a  national  religion,  when  men  speak  as  if  it 
were  the  only  safeguard  of  conduct ;  and  assume  that,  but 
for  the  fear  of  being  burned,  or  for  the  hope  of  being  re- 
warded, everybody  would  pass  their  lives  in  lying,  stealing, 
and  murdering.  I  think  quite  one  of  the  notablest  historical 
events  of  this  century  (perhaps  the  very  notablest),  was  that 
council  of  clergymen,  horror-struck  at  the  idea  of  any  dimi- 
nution in  our  dread  of  hell,  at  which  the  last  of  English 


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91 


clergymen  whom  one  would  have  expected  to  see  in  such  a 
function,  rose  as  the  devil's  advocate  ;  to  tell  us  how  impos- 
sible it  was  we  could  get  on  without  him. 

Violet  {after  a  pause).  But,  surely,  if  people  weren't 
afraid — (hesitates  again). 

L.  They  should  be  afraid  of  doing  wrong,  and  of  that  only, 
my  dear.  Otherwise,  if  they  only  don't  do  wrong  for  fear  of 
being  punished,  they  have  done  wrong  in  their  hearts,  al- 
ready. 

Violet.  Well,  but  surely,  at  least  one  ought  to  be  afraid 
of  displeasing  God  ;  and  one's  desire  to  please  Him  should 
be  one's  first  motive  ? 

L.  He  never  would  be  pleased  with  us,  if  it  were,  my  dear. 
When  a  father  sends  his  son  out  into  the  world — suppose  as 
tin  apprentice — fancy  the  boy's  coming  home  at  night,  and 
saying,  ' Father,  I  could  have  robbed  the  till  to-day  ;  but 
I  didn't,  because  I  thought  you  wouldn't  like  it.'  Do  you 
think  the  father  wTould  be  particularly  pleased  ? 

(Violet  is  silent.) 

He  wrould  answer,  would  he  not,  if  he  were  wise  and  good, 
c  My  boy,  though  you  had  no  father,  you  must  not  rob  tills  '  ? 
And  nothing  is  ever  done  so  as  really  to  please  our  Great 
Father,  unless  we  wTould  also  have  done  it,  though  we  had 
had  no  Father  to  know  of  it. 

Violet  (after  long  pause).  But,  then,  what  continual 
threatenings,  and  promises  of  reward  there  are  ! 

L.  And  how  vain  both  !  with  the  Jews,  and  with  all  of  us. 
But  the  fact  is,  that  the  threat  and  promise  are  simply  state- 
ments of  the  Divine  law,  and  of  its  consequences.  The  fact 
is  truly  told  you, — make  what  use  you  may  of  it :  and  as  col- 
lateral warning,  or  encouragement,  or  comfort,  the  knowledge 
of  future  consequences  may  often  be  helpful  to  us  ;  but 
helpful  chiefly  to  the  better  state  when  we  can  act  without 
reference  to  them.  And  there's  no  measuring  the  poisoned 
influence  of  that  notion  of  future  reward  on  the  mind  of 
Christian  Europe,  in  the  early  ages.  Half  the  monastic  sys- 
tem rose  out  of  that,  acting  on  the  occult  pride  and  ambition 


THE  ETHICS  OF  THE  DUST, 


of  good  people  (as  the  other  half  of  it  came  of  their  follies 
and  misfortunes).  There  is  always  a  considerable  quantity  of 
pride,  to  begin  with,  in  what  is  called  '  giving  one's  self  to 
God.'    As  if  one  had  ever  .belonged  to  anybody  else! 

Dora.  But.  surely,  great  good  has  come  out  of  the  monastic 
system — our  books, — our  sciences — all  saved  by  the  monks? 

L.  Saved  from  what,  my  dear  ?  From  the  abyss  of  misery 
and  ruin  which  that  false  Christianity  allowed  the  whole 
active  world  to  live  in.  When  it  had  become  the  principal 
amusement,  and  the  most  admired  art,  of  Christian  men,  to 
cut  one  another's  throats,  and  burn  one  another's  towns ;  of 
course  the  few  feeble  or  reasonable  persons  left,  who  desired 
quiet,  safety,  and  kind  fellowship,  got  into  cloisters  ;  and  the 
gentlest,  though tfull est,  noblest  men  and  women  shut  them- 
selves up,  precisely  where  they  could  be  of  least  use.  They 
are  very  fine  things,  for  us  painters,  now, — the  towers  and 
white  arches  upon  the  tops  of  the  rocks  ;  always  in  places 
where  it  takes  a  day's  climbing  to  get  at  them ;  but  the 
intense  tragi-comedy  of  the  thing,  when  one  thinks  of  it,  is 
unspeakable.  All  the  good  people  of  the  world  getting 
themselves  hung  up  out  of  the  way,  of  mischief,  like  Bailie 
Nicol  Jarvie  ; — poor  little  lambs,  as  it  were,  dangling  there 
for  the  sign  of  the  Golden  Fleece ;  or  like  Socrates  in  his 
basket  in  the  'Clouds'!  (I  must  read  you"  that  bit  of 
Aristophanes  again,  by  the  way.)  And  believe  me,  children, 
I  am  no  warped  witness,  as  far  as  regards  monasteries  ;  or  if 
I  am,  it  is  in  their  favour.  I  have  always  had  a  strong  lean- 
ing that  way ;  and  have  pensively  shivered  with  Augustines 
at  St.  Bernard  ;  and  happily  made  hay  with  Franciscans  at 
Fesole  ;  and  sat  silent  with  Carthusians  in  their  little  gardens, 
south  of  Florence  ;  and  mourned  through  many  a  day-dream, 
at  Melrose  and  Bolton.  But  the  wonder  is  always  to  me,  not 
how  much,  but  how  little,  the  monks  have,  on  the  whole, 
done,  with  all  that  leisure,  and  all  that  good-will !  What 
nonsense  monks  characteristically  wrote  ; — what  little  progress* 
they  made  in  the  sciences  to  which  they  devoted  themselves 
as  a  duty, — medicine  especially  ; — and,  last  and  worst,  what 
depths  of  degradation  they  can  sometimes  see  one  another 


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93 


and  the  population  round  them,  sink  into  ;  without  either 
doubting  their  system,  or  reforming  it ! 

(Seeing  questions  rising  to  lips.)  Hold  your  little  tongues, 
children  ;  it's  very  late,  and  you'll  make  me  forget  what  I've 
to  say.  Fancy  yourselves  in  pews,  for  five  minutes.  There's 
one  point  of  possible  good  in  the  conventual  system,  which 
is  always  attractive  to  young  girls  ;  and  the  idea  is  a  very 
dangerous  one  ; — the  notion  of  a  merit,  or  exalting  virtue, 
consisting  in  a  habit  of  meditation  on  the  '  things  above,' 
or  things  of  the  next  world.  Now  it  is  quite  true,  that  a 
person  of  beautiful  mind,  dwelling  on  whatever  appears 
to  them  most  desirable  and  lovely  in  a  possible  future 
will  not  only  pass  their  time  pleasantly,  but  will  even  ac- 
quire, at  last,  a  vague  and  wildly  gentle  charm  of  manner 
and  feature,  wrhich  will  give  them  an  air  of  peculiar  sanctity 
in  the  eyes  of  others.  Whatever  real  or  apparent  good  there 
may  be  in  this  result,  I  want  you  to  observe,  children,  that 
we  have  no  real  authority  for  the  reveries  to  which  it  is 
owing.  We  are  told  nothing  distinctly  of  the  heavenly 
world  ;  except  that  it  will  be  free  from  sorrow,  and  pure 
from  sin.  What  is  said  of  pearl  gates,  golden  floors,  and  the 
like,  is  accepted  as  merely  figurative  by  religious  enthusiasts 
themselves  ;  and  whatever  they  pass  their  time  in  conceiving, 
whether  of  the  happiness  of  risen  souls,  of  their  intercourse, 
or  of  the  appearance  and  employment  of  the  heavenly 
powers,  is  entirely  the  product  of  their  own  imagination  ;  and 
as  completely  and  distinctly  a  work  of  fiction,  or  romantic 
invention,  ag  any  novel  of  Sir  Walter  Scott's.  That  the 
romance  is  founded  on  religious  theory  or  doctrine  ; — that  no 
disagreeable  or  wicked  persons  are  admitted  into  the  story ; 
— and  that  the  inventor  fervently  hopes  that  some  portion  of 
it  may  hereafter  come  true,  does  not  in  the  least  alter  the 
real  nature  of  the  effort  or  enjoyment. 

Now,  whatever  indulgence  may  be  granted  to  amiable 
people  for  pleasing  themselves  in  this  innocent  way,  it  is 
beyond  question,  that  to  seclude  themselves  from  the  rough 
duties  of  life,  merely  to  write  religious  romances,  or,  as  in 
most  cases,  merely  to  dream  them,  without  taking  so  much 


THE  ETHICS  OF  THE  DUST, 


trouble  as  is  implied  in  writing,  ought  not  to  be  received  as 
an  act  of  heroic  virtue.  But,  observe,  even  in  admitting 
thus  much,  I  have  assumed  that  the  fancies  are  just  and 
beautiful,  though  fictitious.  Now,  what  right  have  any  of 
us  to  assume  that  our  own  fancies  will  assuredly  be  either 
the  one  or  the  other?  That  they  delight  us,  and  appear 
lovely  to  us,  is  no  real  proof  of  its  not  being  wasted  time  ta 
form  them  :  and  we  may  surely  be  led  somewhat  to  distrust 
our  judgment  of  them  by  observing  what  ignoble  imagina- 
tions have  sometimes  sufficiently,  or  even  enthusiastically, 
occupied  the  hearts  of  others.  The  principal  source  of  the 
spirit  of  religious  contemplation  is  the  East ;  now  I  have  here 
in  my  hand  a  Byzantine  image  of  Christ,  which,  if  you  will 
look  at  it  seriously,  may,  I  think,  at  once  and  for  ever  render 
you  cautious  in  the  indulgence  of  a  merely  contemplative 
habit  of  mind.  Observe,  it  is  the  fashion  to  look  at  such  a 
thing  only  as  a  piece  of  barbarous  art ;  that  is  the  smallest 
part  of  its  interest.  What  I  want  you  to  see,  is  the  baseness 
and  falseness  of  a  religious  state  of  enthusiasm,  in  which 
such  a  work  could  be  dwelt  upon  with  pious  pleasure.  That 
a  figure,  with  two  small  round  black  beads  for  eyes  ;  a  gilded 
face,  deep  cut  into  horrible  wrinkles  ;  an  open  gash  for  a 
mouth,  and  a  distorted  skeleton  for  a  body,  wrapped  about, 
to  make  it  fine,  with  striped  enamel  of  blue  and'  gold  ; — that 
such  a  figure,  I  say,  should  ever  have  been  thought  helpful 
towards  the  conception  of  a  Eedeeming  Deity,  may  make 
you,  I  think,  very  doubtful,  even  of  the  Divine  approval, — 
much  more  of  the  Divine  inspiration, — of  religious  reverie  in 
general.  You  feel,  doubtless,  that  your  own  idea  of  Christ 
would  be  something  very  different  from  this  ;  but  in  what 
does  the  difference  consist  ?  Not  in  any  more  divine  author- 
ity in  your  imagination  ;  but  in  the  intellectual  work  of  six 
intervening  centuries  ;  which,  simply,  by  artistic  discipline, 
has  refined  this  crude  conception  for  you,  and  filled  you, 
partly  with  an  innate  sensation,  partly  with  an  acquired 
knowledge,  of  higher  forms, — which  render  this  Byzantine 
crucifix  as  horrible  to  you,  as  it  was  pleasing  to  its  maker. 
More  is  required  to  excite  your  fancy  ;  but  your  fancy  is  of 


HOME  VIRTUES. 


no  more  authority  than  his  was  :  and  a  point  of  national  art- 
skill  is  quite  conceivable,  in  which  the  best  we  can  do  now 
will  be  as  offensive  to  the  religious  dreamers  of  the  more 
highly  cultivated  time,  as  this  Byzantine  crucifix  is  to  you. 

Mary.  But  surely,  Angelico  will  always  retain  his  power 
over  everybody  ? 

L.  Yes,  I  should  think,  always  ;  as  the  gentle  words  of  a 
child  will :  but  you  would  be  much  surprised,  Mary,  if  you 
thoroughly  took  the  pains  to  analyse,  and  had  the  perfect 
means  of  analysing,  that  power  of  Angelico, — to  discover  its 
real  sources.  Of  course  it  is  natural,  at  first,  to  attribute  it 
to  the  pure  religious  fervour  by  which  he  was  inspired  ;  but 
do  you  suppose  Angelico  was  really  the  only  monk,  in  all  the 
Christian  world  of  the  middle  ages,  who  laboured,  in  art,  with 
a  sincere  religious  enthusiasm  ? 

Mary.  No,  certainly  not. 

L.  Anything  more  frightful,  more  destructive  of  all  relig- 
ious faith  whatever,  than  such  a  supposition,  could  not  be. 
And  yet,  what  other  monk  ever  produced  such  work  ?  I  have 
myself  examined  carefully  upwards  of  two  thousand  illumin- 
ated missals,  with  especial  view  to  the  discovery  of  any  evi- 
dence of  a  similar  result  upon  the  art,  from  the  monkish 
devotion  ;  and  utterly  in  vain. 

Mary.  But  then,  was  not  Fra  Angelico  a  man  of  entirely 
separate  and  exalted  genius  ? 

L.  Unquestionably ;  and  granting  him  to  be  that,  the  pecul- 
iar phenomenon  in  his  art  is,  to  me,  not  its  loveliness,  but  its 
weakness.  The  effect  of  'inspiration/  had  it  been  real,  on  a 
man  of  consummate  genius,  should  have  been,  one  would 
have  thought,  to  make  everything  that  he  did  faultless  and 
strong,  no  less  than  lovely.  But  of  all  men,  deserving  to  be 
called  *  great,'  Fra  Angelico  permits  to  himself  the  least  par- 
donable faults,  and  the  most  palpable  follies.  There  is  evi- 
dently within  him  a  sense  of  grace,  and  power  of  invention, 
♦is  great  as  Ghiberti's  : — we  are  in  the  habit  of  attributing 
those  high  qualities  to  his  religious  enthusiasm  ;  but,  if  they 
were  produced  by  that  enthusiasm  in  him,  they  ought  to  be 
produced  by  the  same  feelings  in  others ;  and  we  see  they 


TEE  ETHICS  OF  THE  DUST. 


are  not.  Whereas,  comparing  him  with  contemporary  great 
artists,  of  equal  grace  and  invention,  one  peculiar  character 
remains  notable  in  him — which,  logically,  we  ought  therefore 
to  attribute  to  the  religious  fervour  ; — and  that  distinctive 
character  is,  the  contented  indulgence  of  his  own  weaknesses, 
and  perseverance  in  his  own  ignorances. 

Mary.  But  that's  dreadful !  And  what  is  the  source  of  the 
peculiar  charm  which  we  all  feel  in  his  work  ? 

L.  There  are  many  sources  of  it,  Mary ;  united  and  seem- 
ing like  one.  You  would  never  feel  that  charm  but  in  the 
work  of  an  entirely  good  man ;  be  sure  of  that ;  but  the 
goodness  is  only  the  recipient  and  modifying  element,  not  the 
creative  one.  Consider  carefully  what  delights  you  in  any 
original  picture  of  Angelico's.  You  will  find,  for  one  minor 
thing,  an  exquisite  variety  and  brightness  of  ornamental 
work.  That  is  not  Angelico's  inspiration.  It  is  the  final 
result  of  the  labour  and  thought  of  millions  of  artists,  of  all 
nations  ;  from  the  earliest  Egyptian  potters  downwards — 
Greeks,  Byzantines,  Hindoos,  Arabs,  Gauls,  and  Northmen — 
all  joining  in  the  toil ;  and  consummating  it  in  Florence,  in 
that  century,  with  such  embroidery  of  robe  and  inlaying  of 
armour  as  had  never  been  seen  till  then  ;  nor,  probably,  ever 
will  be  seen  more.  Angelico  merely  takes  his  share  of  this 
inheritance,  and  applies  it  in  the  tenderest  way  to  subjects 
which  are  peculiarly  acceptant  of  it.  But  the  inspiration,  if 
it  exist  anywhere,  flashes  on  the  knight's  shield  quite  as  ra- 
diantly as  on  the  monk's  picture.  Examining  farther  into 
the  sources  of  your  emotion  in  the  Angelico  work,  you  will 
find  much  of  the  impression  of  sanctity  dependent  on  a  sin- 
gular repose  and  grace  of  gesture,  consummating  itself  in  the 
floating,  flying,  and  above  all,  in  the  dancing  groups.  That 
is  not  Angelico's  inspiration.  It  is  only  a  peculiarly  tender 
use  of  systems  of  grouping  which  had  been  long  before  de- 
veloped by  Giotto,  Memmi,  and  Orcagna  ;  and  the  real  root 
of  it  all  is  simply — What  do  you  think,  children  ?  The  beau- 
tiful dancing  of  the  Florentine  maidens  ! 

Dora  (indignant  again).  Now,  I  wonder  what  next !  Why 
not  say  it  all  depended  on  Herodias'  daughter,  at  once  ? 


HOME  VIRTUES. 


97 


L.  Yes  ;  it  is  certainly  a  great  argument  against  singing, 
that  there  were  once  sirens. 

Dora.  Well,  it  may  be  all  very  fine  and  philosophical,  but 
shouldn't  I  just  like  to  read  you  the  end  of  the  second  volume 
of  '  Modern  Painters ' ! 

L.  My  dear,  do  you  think  any  teacher  could  be  worth  your 
listening  to,  or  anybody  else's  listening  to,  who  had  learned 
nothing,  and  altered  his  mind  in  nothing,  from  seven  and 
twenty  to  seven  and  forty  ?  But  that  second  volume  is  very 
good  for  you  as  far  as  it  goes.  It  is  a  great  advance,  and  a 
thoroughly  straight  and  swift  one,  to  be  led,  as  it  is  the  main 
business  of  that  second  volume  to  lead  you,  from  Dutch  cattle 
pieces,  and  ruffian-pieces,  to  Fra  Angelico.  And  it  is  right 
for  you  also,  as  you  grow  older,  to  be  strengthened  in  the 
general  sense  and  judgment  which  may  enable  you  to  distin- 
guish the  weaknesses  from  the  virtues  of  what  you  love  :  else 
you  might  come  to  love  both  alike  ;  or  even  the  weaknesses 
without  the  virtues.  You  might  end  by  liking  Overbeck  and 
Cornelius  as  well  as  Angelico.  However,  I  have  perhaps  been 
leaning  a  little  too  much  to  the  merely  practical  side  of 
things,  in  to-night's  talk ;  and  you  are  always  to  remember, 
children,  that  I  do  not  deny,  though  I  cannot  affirm,  the 
spiritual  advantages  resulting,  in  certain  cases,  from  enthusi- 
astic religous  reverie,  and  from  the  other  practices  of  saints 
and  anchorites.  The  evidence  respecting  them  has  never  yet 
been  honestly  collected,  much  less  dispassionately  examined  : 
but  assuredly,  there  is  in  that  direction  a  probability,  and 
more  than  a  probability,  of  dangerous  error,  while  there  is 
none  whatever  in  the  practice  of  an  active,  cheerful,  and 
benevolent  life.  The  hope  of  attaining  a  higher  religious 
position,  which  induces  us  to  encounter,  for  its  exalted  alterna- 
tive, the  risk  of  unhealthy  error,  is  often,  as  I  said,  founded 
more  on  pride  than  piety  ;  and  those  who,  in  modest  useful- 
ness, have  accepted  what  seemed  to  them  here  the  lowliest 
place  in  the  kingdom  of  their  Father,  are  not,  I  believe,  the 
least  likely  to  receive  hereafter  the  command,  then  unmistaka* 
ble,  *  Friend,  go  up  higher/ 


LECTURE  VIII. 


CRYSTAL  CAPRICE. 

Formal  Lecture  in  Schoolroom,  after  some  practical  examination  of 

minerals. 

L.  We  have  seen  enough,  children,  though  very  little  of 
what  might  be  seen  if  we  had  more  time,  of  mineral  struct- 
ures produced  by  visible  opposition,  or  contest  among  ele- 
ments ;  structures  of  which  the  variety,  however  great,  need 
not  surprise  us :  for  we  quarrel,  ourselves,  for  many  and 
slight  causes ; — much  more,  one  should  think,  may  crystals, 
who  can  only  feel  the  antagonism,  not  argue  about  it.  But 
there  is  a  yet  more  singular  mimicry  of  our  human  ways  in  the 
varieties  of  form  which  appear  owing  to  no  antagonistic  force  ; 
but  merely  to  the  variable  humour  and  caprice  of  the  crystals 
themselves  :  and  I  have  asked  you  all  to  come  into  the  school- 
room to-day,  because,  of  course,  this  is  a  part  of  the  crystal 
mind  which  must  be  peculiarly  interesting  to  a  feminine 
audience.  {Great  symptoms  of  MmpproMl  on  the  part  of  said 
audience.)  Now,  you  need  not  pretend  that  it  will  not  in- 
terest }^ou  ;  why  should  it  not  ?  It  is  true  that  we  men  are 
never  capricious  ;  but  that  only  makes  us  the  more  dull 
and  disagreeable.  You,  who  are  crystalline  in  brightness,  as 
well  as  in  caprice,  charm  infinitely,  by  infinitude  of  change. 
{Audible  murmurs  of  '  Worse  and  worse  ! '  '  As  if  we  could  be 
got  over  that  way  I '  &c.  The  Lecturer,  however,  observing  the 
expression  of  the  features  to  be  more  complacent,  proceeds.) 
And  the  most  curious  mimicry,  if  not  of  your  changes  of 
fashion,  at  least  of  your  various  modes  (in  healthy  periods)  of 
national  costume,  takes  place  among  the  crystals  of  different 
countries.  With  a  little  experience,  it  is  quite  possible  to 
3ay  at  a  glance,  in  what  districts  certain  crystals  have  been 


CRYSTAL  CAPRICE. 


99 


found  ;  and  although,  if  we  had  knowledge  extended  and 
accurate  enough,  we  might  of  course  ascertain  the  laws  and 
circumstances  which  have  necessarily  produced  the  form  pe- 
culiar to  each  locality,  this  would  be  just  as  true  of  the 
fancies  of  the  human  mind.  If  we  could  know  the  exact  cir- 
cumstances which  affect  it,  we  could  foretell  what  now  seems 
to  us  only  caprice  of  thought,  as  well  as  what  now  seems  to 
us  only  caprice  of  crystal :  nay,  so  far  as  our  knowledge 
reaches,  it  is  on  the  whole  easier  to  find  some  reason  v/hy  the 
peasant  girls  of  Berne  should  wear  their  caps  in  the  shape  of 
butterflies ;  and  the  peasant  girls  of  Munich  their's  in  the 
shape  of  shells,  than  to  say  why  the  rock-crystals  of  Dauphine 
should  all  have  their  summits  of  the  shape  of  lip-pieces  of 
flageolets,  while  those  of  St.  Gothard  are  symmetrical :  or 
why  the  fluor  of  Chamouni  is  rose-coloured,  and  in  octahe- 
drons, while  the  fluor  of  Weardale  is  green,  and  in  cubes. 
Still  farther  removed  is  the  hope,  at  present,  of  accounting 
for  minor  differences  in  modes  of  grouping  and  construction. 
Take,  for  instance,  the  caprices  of  this  single  mineral,  quartz  ; 
—variations  upon  a  single  theme.  It  has  many  forms  ;  but 
see  what  it  will  make  out  of  this  one,  the  six-sided  prism. 
For  shortness'  sake,  I  shall  call  the  body  of  the  prism  its 
*  column/  and  the  pyramid  at  the  extremities  its  '  cap.'  Now, 
here,  first  you  have  a  straight  column,  as  long  and  thin  as  a 
stalk  of  asparagus,  with  two  little  caps  at  the  ends  ;  and  here 
you  have  a  short  thick  column,  as  solid  as  a  haystack,  with 
two  fat  caps  at  the  ends  ;  and  here  you  have  two  caps  fastened 
together,  and  no  column  at  all  between  them  !  Then  here  is 
a  crystal  with  its  column  fat  in  the  middle,  and  tapering  to  a 
little  cap  ;  and  here  is  one  stalked  like  a  mushroom,  with  a 
huge  cap  put  on  the  top  of  a  slender  column  !  Then  here  is 
a  column  built  wholly  out  of  little  caps,  with  a  large  smooth 
cap  at  the  top.  And  here  is  a  column  built  of  columns  and 
caps  ;  the  caps  all  truncated  about  half  way  to  their  points. 
And  in  both  these  last,  the  little  crystals  are  set  anyhow,  and 
build  the  large  one  in  a  disorderly  way  ;  but  here  is  a  crystal 
made  of  columns  and  truncated  caps,  set  in  regular  terraces 
all  the  way  up. 


100 


THE  ETHICS  OF  THE  DUST. 


Mary.  But  are  not  these,  groups  of  crystals,  rather  than 

one  crystal  ? 

L.  What  do  you  mean  by  a  group,  and  what  by  one 

crystal  ? 

Dora  [audibly  aside,  to  Mary,  who  is  brought  to  pause).  You 
know  you  are  never  expected  to  answer,  Mary. 

L.  I'm  sure  this  is  easy  enough.  What  do  you  mean  by  a 
group  of  people  ? 

Mary.  Three  or  four  together,  or  a  good  many  together, 
like  the  caps  in  these  crystals. 

L.  But  when  a  great  many  persons  get  together  they  don't 
take  the  shape  of  one  person  ? 

(Mary  still  at  pause.) 

Isabel.  No,  because  they  can't ;  but,  you  know  the  crystals 
can  ;  so  why  shouldn't  they  ? 

L.  Well,  they  don't ;  that  is  to  say,  they  don't  always,  nor 
even  often.    Look  here,  Isabel. 

Isabel.  What  a  nasty  ugly  thing  ! 

L.  I'm  glad  you  think  it  so  ugly.  Yet  it  is  made  of  beau- 
tiful crystals  ;  they  are  a  little  grey  and  cold  in  colour,  but 
most  of  them  are  clear. 

Isabel.  But  they're  in  such  horrid,  horrid  disorder ! 

L.  Yes  ;  all  disorder  is  horrid,  when  it  is  among  things 
that  are  naturally  orderly.  Some  little  girl's  rooms  are  natu- 
rally disorderly,  I  suppose ;  or  I  don't  know  how  they  could 
live  in  them,  if  they  cry  out  so  when  they  only  see  quartz 
crystals  in  confusion. 

Isabel.  Oh  !  but  how  come  they  to  be  like  that? 

L.  You  may  well  ask.  And  yet  you  will  always  hear  peo- 
ple talking  as  if  they  thought  order  more  wonderful  than  dis- 
order !  It  is  wonderful — as  we  have  seen  ;  but  to  me,  as  to 
you,  child,  the  supremely  wonderful  thing  is  that  nature 
should  ever  be  ruinous  or  wasteful,  or  deathful !  I  look  at 
this  wild  piece  of  crystallisation  with  endless  astonishment. 

Mary.  Where  does  it  come  from? 

L.  The  Tete  Noire  of  Chamonix.  What  makes  it  more 
strange  is  that  it  should  be  in  a  vein  of  fine  quartz  rock,    If  it 


CRYSTAL  CAPRICE. 


101 


were  in  a  mouldering  rock,  it  would  be  natural  enough  ;  but 
in  the  midst  of  so  fine  substance,  here  are  the  crystals  tossed 
in  a  heap  ;  some  large,  myriads  small  (almost  as  small  as 
dust),  tumbling  over  each  other  like  a  terrified  crowd,  and 
glued  together  by  the  sides,  and  edges,  and  backs,  and  heads ; 
some  warped,  and  some  pushed  out  and  in,  and  all  spoiled^ 
and  each  spoiling  the  rest. 

Mary.  And  how  fiat  they  all  are  ! 

L  Yes  ;  that's  the  fashion  at  the  Tete  Noire. 

Mary.  But  surely  this  is  ruin,  not  caprice  ? 

L.  I  believe  it  is  in  great  part  misfortune  ;  and  we  will  ex- 
amine these  crystal  troubles  in  next  lecture.  But  if  you  want 
to  see  the  gracefullest  and  happiest  caprices  of  which  dust  is 
capable,  you  must  go  to  the  Hartz  ;  not  that  I  ever  mean  to 
go  there  myself,  for  I  want  to  retain  the  romantic  feeling 
about  the  name  ;  and  I  have  done  myself  some  harm  already 
by  seeing  the  monotonous  and  heavy  form  of  the  Brocken 
from  the  suburbs  of  Brunswick.  But  whether  the  mountains 
be  picturesque  or  not,  the  tricks  which  the  goblins  (as  I  am 
told)  teach  the  crystals  in  them,  are  incomparably  pretty. 
They  work  chiefly  on  the  mind  of  a  docile,  bluish  coloured, 
carbonate  of  lime  ;  which  comes  out  of  a  grey  limestone. 
The  goblins  take  the  greatest  possible  care  of  its  education, 
and  see  that  nothing  happens  to  it  to  hurt  its  temper  ;  and 
when  it  may  be  supposed  to  have  arrived  at  the  crisis  which 
is,  to  a  well  brought  up  mineral,  what  presentation  at  court  is 
to  a  young  lady — after  which  it  is  expected  to  set  fashions — 
mere's  no  end  to  its  pretty  ways  of  behaving.  First  it  will 
\nake  itself  into  pointed  darts  as  fine  as  hoar-frost ;  here,  it 

changed  into  a  white  fur  as  fine  as  silk  ;  here  into  little 
crowns  and  circlets,  as  bright  as  silver  ;  as  if  for  the  gnome 
princesses  to  wear ;  here  it  is  in  beautiful  little  plates,  for 
them  to  eat  off ;  presently  it  is  in  towers  which  they  might  be 
imprisoned  in  ;  presently  in  caves  and  cells,  where  they  may 
make  nun-gnomes  of  themselves,  and  no  gnome  ever  hear  of 
them  more  ;  here  is  some  of  it  in  sheaves,  like  corn ;  here,  some 
in  drifts,  like  snow ;  here,  some  in  rays,  like  stars :  and,  though 
ihese  are,  all  of  them,  necessarily,  shapes  that  the  mineral 


102 


THE  ETHICS  OF  THE  DUST. 


takes  in  other  places,  they  are  all  taken  here  with  such  a  grace 
that  you  recognise  the  high  caste  and  breeding  of  the  crystals 
wherever  you  meet  them  ;  and  know  at  once  they  are  Hartz- 
born. 

Of  course,  such  fine  things  as  these  are  only  done  by  crys- 
tals which,  are  perfectly  good,  and  good-humoured  ;  and  of 
course,  also,  there  are  ill-humoured  crystals  who  torment  each 
other,  and  annoy  quieter  crystals,  yet  without  coming  to  any- 
thing like  serious  war.  Here  (for  once)  is  some  ill-disposed 
quartz,  tormenting  a  peaceable  octahedron  of  fluor,  in  mere 
caprice.  I  looked  at  it  the  other  night  so  long,  and  so  won- 
cleringly,  just  before  putting  my  candle  out,  that  I  fell  into 
another  strange  dream.    But  you  don't  care  about  dreams. 

Dora.  No  ;  we  didn't,  yesterday  ;  but  you  know  we  are 
made  up  of  caprice  ;  so  we  do,  to-day :  and  you  must  tell  it 
us  directly. 

L.  Well,  you  see,  Neith  and  her  work  were  still  much  in 
my  mind  ;  and  then,  I  had  been  looking  over  these  Hartz 
things  for  you,  and  thinking  of  the  sort  of  grotesque  sympa- 
thy there  seemed  to  be  in  them  with  the  beautiful  fringe  and 
pinnacle  work  of  Northern  architecture.  So,  when  I  fell 
asleep,  I  thought  I  saw  Neith  and  St.  Barbara  talking 
together. 

Dora.  But  what  had  St.  Barbara  to  do  with  it?  * 
L.  My  dear,  I  am  quite  sure  St.  Barbara  is  the  patroness 
of  good  architects  :  not  St.  Thomas,  whatever  the  old  build- 
ers thought.  It  might  be  very  fine,  according  to  the  monks' 
uotions,  in  St.  Thomas,  to  give  all  his  employer's  money  away 
to  the  poor :  but  breaches  of  contract  are  bad  foundations ; 
and  I  believe,  it  was  not  he,  but  St.  Barbara,  who  overlooked 
the  work  in  all  the  buildings  you  and  I  care  about.  HowTever 
that  may  be,  it  was  certainly  she  whom  I  saw  in  my  dream 
with  Neith.  Neith  wras  sitting  weaving,  and  I  thought  she 
looked  sad,  and  threw  her  shuttle  slowly  ;  and  St.  Barbara  was 
standing  at  her  side,  in  a  stiff  little  gown,  all  ins  and  outs,  and 
angles  ;  but  so  bright  with  embroidery  that  it  dazzled  me  when- 
ever she  moved  ;  the  train  of  it  was  just  like  a  heap  of  broken 

*  JNTote  v. 


CRYSTAL  OA  PRICE. 


103 


jewels,  it  was  so  stiff,  and  full  of  corners,  and  so  many-coloured, 
and  bright.  Her  hair  fell  over  her  shoulders  in  long,  delicate 
waves,  from  under  a  little  three  pinnacled  crown,  like  a  tower. 
She  was  asking  Neith  about  the  laws  of  architecture  in  Egypt 
and  Greece  ;  and  when  Neith  told  her  the  measures  of  the 
pyramids,  St.  Barbara  said  she  thought  they  would  have  been 
better  three-cornered :  and  when  Neith  told  her  the  measures 
of  the  Parthenon,  St.  Barbara  said  she  thought  it  ought  to 
have  had  two  transepts.  But  she  was  pleased  when  Neith 
told  her  of  the  temple  of  the  dew,  and  of  the  Caryan  maidens 
bearing  its  frieze :  and  then  she  thought  that  perhaps  Neith 
would  like  to  hear  what  sort  of  temples  she  was  building  her- 
self, in  the  French  valleys,  and  on  the  crags  of  the  Rhine. 
So  she  began  gossiping,  just  as  one  of  you  might  to  an  old 
lady  :  and  certainly  she  talked  in  the  sweetest  way  in  the  world 
to  Neith  ;  and  explained  to  her  all  about  crockets  and  pin- 
nacles :  and  Neith  sat,  looking  very  grave  ;  and  always  graver 
as  St.  Barbara  went  on ;  till  at  last,  I'm  sorry  to  say,  St.  Bar- 
bara lost  her  temper  a  little. 

May  (very  grave  herself).    '  St.  Barbara  ?' 

L.  Yes,  May.  "Why  shouldn't  she  ?  It  was  very  tiresome 
of  Neith  to  sit  looking  like  that. 

May.  But,  then,  St.  Barbara  was  a  saint ! 

L.  What's  that,  May? 

May.  A  saint !    A  saint  is — I  am  sure  you  know  ! 

L.  If  I  did,  it  wrould  not  make  me  sure  that  you  knew  too, 
May  :  but  I  don't. 

Violet  (expressing  the  incredulity  of  the  audience).   Oh, — sir ! 

L.  That  is  to  say,  I  know  that  people  are  called  saints  w7ho 
are  supposed  to  be  better  than  others :  but  I  don't  know  how 
much  better  they  must  be,  in  order  to  be  saints  ;  nor  how 
nearly  anybody  may  be  a  saint,  and  yet  not  be  quite  one  ;  nor 
whether  everybody  who  is  called  a  saint  was  one ;  nor  whether 
everybody  who  isn't  called  a  saint,  isn't  one. 

(General  silence  ;  the  audience  feeling  themselves  on  the 
verge  of  the  Infinities — and  a  little  shocked — and  much 
puzzled  by  so  many  questions  at  once.) 


THE  ETHICS  OF  THE  DUST, 


L,  Besides,  did  you  never  hear  that  verse  about  being '  called 
to  be  saints '  ? 

May  (repeats  Bom.  i.  7. ) 

L.  Quite  right,  May.  Well,  then,  who  are  called  to  be  that? 
People  in  Rome  only  ? 

May.  Everybody,  I  suppose,  whom  God  loves. 

L.  What !  little  girls  as  well  as  other  people  ? 

May.  All  grown-up  people,  I  mean. 

L  AVhy  not  little  girls  ?  Are  they  wickeder  when  they  are 
little  ? 

May.  Ob,  I  hope  not. 

L.  Why  not  little  girls,  then  ? 

(Pause.) 

Lily.  Because,  you  know,  we  can't  be  worth  anything  if 
we're  ever  so  good  ; — I  mean,  if  we  try  to  be  ever  so  good ; 
and  we  can't  do  difficult  things — like  saints. 

L.  I  am  afraid,  my  dear,  that  old  people  are  not  more  able 
or  willing  for  their  difficulties  than  you  children  are  for  yours, 
All  I  can  say  is,  that  if  ever  I  see  any  of  you,  when  you  are 
seven  or  eight  and  twenty,  knitting  your  brows  over  any  work 
you  want  to  do  or  to  understand,  as  I  saw  you,  Lily,  knitting 
your  brows  over  your  slate  this  morning,  I  should  think  you 
very  noble  women.  But — to  come  back  to  my  dream — St. 
Barbara  did  lose  her  temper  a  little  ;  and  I  was  not  surprised. 
For  you  can't  think  how  provoking  Neith  looked,  sitting  there 
just  like  a  statue  of  sandstone  ;  only  going  on  weaving,  like  a 
machine  ;  and  never  quickening  the  cast  of  her  shuttle  ;  while 
St.  Barbara  was  telling  her  so  eagerly  all  about  the  most  beau- 
tiful things,  and  chattering  away,  as  fast  as  bells  ring  on  Christ- 
mas Eve,  till  she  saw  that  Neith  didn't  care  ;  and  then  St. 
Barbara  got  as  red  as  a  rose,  and  stopped,  just  in  time  ; — or 
I  think  she  would  really  have  said  something  naughty. 

Isabel.  Oh,  please,  but  didn't  Neith  say  anything  then? 

L.  Yes.  She  said,  quite  quietly,  'It  may  be  very  pretty, 
my  love  ;  but  it  is  all  nonsense.' 

Isabel.  Oh  dear,  oh  dear  ;  and  then  ? 

L,  Well ;  then  I  was  a  little  angry  myself,  and  hoped  St 


vltYSTAL  CAPRICE. 


105 


Barbara  would  be  quite  angry  ;  but  she  wasn't.    She  bit  her 
lips  first ;  and  then  gave  a  great  sigh — such  a  wild,  sweet 
sigh — and  then  she  knelt  down  and  hid  her  face  on  Neiths 
knees*    Then  Neith  smiled  a  little,  and  was  moved. 
Isabel,  Oh,  I  am  so  glad  ! 

L.  And  she  touched  St.  Barbara's  forehead  with  a  flower 
of  whUe  lotus  ;  and  St.  Barbara  sobbed  once  or  twice,  and 
then  mid  :  '  If  you  only  could  see  how  beautiful  it  is,  and  how 
much  it  makes  people  feel  what  is  good  and  lovely  ;  and 
it  yoi*  uould  only  hear  the  children  singing  in  the  Lady  chap- 
els ! f  And  Neith  smiled, — but  still  sadly, — and  said,  ■  How 
do  y<ru  know  what  I  have  seen,  or  heard,  my  love  ?  Do  you 
think  all  those  vaults  and  towers  of  yours  have  been  built 
without  me  ?  There  was  not  a  pillar  in  your  Giotto's  Santa 
Maria  del  Fiore  which  I  did  not  set  true  by  my  spearshaft  as 
it  rose.  But  this  pinnacle  and  flame  work  which  has  set  your 
little  heart  on  fire,  is  all  vanity  ;  and  you  will  see  what  it  will 
come  to,  and  that  soon  ;  and  none  will  grieve  for  it  more 
than  I.  And  then  every  one  will  disbelieve  your  pretty 
symbols  and  types.  Men  must  be  spoken  simply  to,  my 
dear,  if  you  would  guide  them  kindly,  and  long.'  But  St. 
Barbara  answered,  that,  '  Indeed  she  thought  every  one  liked 
her  work,'  and  that  '  the  people  of  different  towns  wrere  as 
eager  about  their  cathedral  towers  as  about  their  privileges 
or  their  markets ; '  and  then  she  asked  Neith  to  come  and 
build  something  with  her,  wall  against  tower ;  and  '  see 
whether  the  people  will  be  as  much  pleased  with  your  build- 
ing as  with  mine.'  But  Neith  answered,  £I  will  not  contend 
with  you,  my  dear.  I  strive  not  with  those  who  love  me  ; 
and  for  those  who  hate  me,  it  is  not  well  to  strive  with  me, 
as  weaver  Arachne  knows.  And  remember,  child,  that  noth- 
ing is  ever  done  beautifully,  which  is  done  in  rivalship  ;  nor 
nobly,  which  is  done  in  pride.' 

Then  St.  Barbara  hung  her  head  quite  down,  and  said  she 
was  very  sorry  she  had  been  so  foolish ;  and  kissed  Neith  ; 
and  stood  thinking  a  minute  :  and  then  her  eyes  got  bright 
again,  and  she  said,  she  would  go  directly  and  build  a  chapel 
with  five  windows  in  it ;  four  for  the  four  cardinal  virtues, 


106 


THE  ETHICS  OF  THE  DUST. 


and  one  for  humility,  in  the  middle,  bigger  than  the  rest 

And  Neith  very  nearly  laughed  quite  out,  I  thought ;  cer« 
tainly  her  beautiful  lips  lost  all  their  sternness  for  an  instant ; 
then  she  said,  '  Well,  love,  build  it,  but  do  not  put  so  many 
colours  into  your  windows  as  you  usually  do  ;  else  no  one 
will  be  able  to  see  to  read,  inside  :  and  when  it  is  built,  let 
a  poor  village  priest  consecrate  it,  and  not  an  archbishop.' 
St.  Barbara  started  a  little,  I  thought,  and  turned  as  if  to  say 
something  ;  but  changed  her  mind,  and  gathered  up  her 
train,  and  went  out.  And  Neith  bent  herself  again  to  her 
loom,  in  which  she  was  weaving  a  web  of  strange  dark  col- 
ours, I  thought ;  but  perhaps  it  wras  only  after  the  glittering 
of  St.  Barbara's  embroidered  train  :  and  I  tried  to  make  out 
the  figures  in  Neith's  web,  and  confused  myself  among  them, 
as  one  always  does  in  dreams  ;  and  then  the  dream  changed 
altogether,  and  I  found  myself,  all  at  once,  among  a  crowd  of 
little  Gothic  and  Egyptian  spirits,  who  were  quarrelling  :  at 
least  the  Gothic  ones  were  trying  to  quarrel ;  for  the  Egyp- 
tian ones  only  sat  with  their  hands  on  their  knees,  and  their 
aprons  sticking  out  very  stiffly ;  and  stared.  And  after  a 
while  I  began  to  understand  what  the  matter  was.  It  seemed 
that  some  of  the  troublesome  building  imps,  who  meddle  and 
make  continually,  even  in  the  best  Gothic  work,  had  been 
listening  to  St.  Barbara's  talk  with  Neith  ;  and  had  made  up 
their  minds  that  Neith  had  no  workpeople  who  could  build 
against  them.  They  were  but  dull  imps,  as  you  may  fancy 
by  their  thinking  that ;  and  never  had  done  much,  except 
disturbing  the  great  Gothic  building  angels  at  their  work, 
and  playing  tricks  to  each  other ;  indeed,  of  late  they  had 
been  living  years  and  years,  like  bats,  up  under  the  cornices 
of  Strasbourg  and  Cologne  cathedrals,  with  nothing  to  do 
but  to  make  mouths  at  the  people  below.  However,  they 
thought  they  knew  everything  about  tower  building  ;  and 
those  who  had  heard  what  Neith  said,  told  the  rest ;  and 
they  all  ilew  down  directly,  chattering  in  German,  like  jack- 
daws, to  show  Neith's  people  what  they  could  do.  And  they 
had  found  some  of  Neith's  old  workpeople  somewhere  near 
Sais,  sitting  in  the  sun,  with  their  hands  on  their  kiiees  ;  and 


CRYSTAL  CAPRICE. 


107 


abused  them  heartily  :  and  Neith's  people  did  not  mind  at 
first,  but,  after  a  while,  they  seemed  to  get  tired  of  the  noise ; 
and  one  or  two  rose  up  slowly,  and  laid  hold  of  their  measur- 
ing rods,  and  said,  cIf  St.  Barbara's  people  liked  to  build 
with  them,  tower  against  pyramid,  they  would  show  them 
how  to  lay  stones.'  Then  the  little  Gothic  spirits  threw  a 
great  many  double  somersaults  for  joy  ;  and  put  the  tips  of 
their  tongues  out  slily  to  each  other,  on  one  side  ;  and  I  heard 
the  Egyptians  say,  f  they  must  be  some  new  kind  of  frog — 
they  didn't  think  there  was  much  building  in  them.'  How- 
ever, the  stiff  old  workers  took  their  rods,  as  I  said,  and 
measured  out  a  square  space  of  sand  ;  but  as  soon  as  the 
German  spirits  saw  that,  they  declared  they  wanted  exactly 
that  bit  of  ground  to  build  on,  themselves.  Then  the  Egyp- 
tian builders  offered  to  go  farther  off,  and  the  Germans  ones 
said,  '  Ja  wohl.'  But  as  soon  as  the  Egyptians  had  measured 
out  another  square,  the  little  Germans  said  they  must  have 
some  of  that  too.  Then  Neith's  people  laughed ;  and  said, 
'  they  might  take  as  much  as  they  liked,  but  they  would  not 
move  the  plan  of  their  pyramid  again.'  Then  the  little  Ger- 
mans took  three  pieces,  and  began  to  build  three  spires 
directly  ;  one  large,  and  two  little.  And  when  the  Egyptians 
saw  they  had  fairly  begun,  they  laid  their  foundation  all 
round,  of  large  square  stones  :  and  began  to  build,  so  steadily 
that  they  had  like  to  have  swallowed  up  the  three  little  Ger- 
man spires.  So  when  the  Gothic  spirits  saw  that,  they  built 
their  spires  leaning,  like  the  tower  of  Pisa,  that  they  might 
stick  out  at  the  side  of  the  pyramid.  And  Neith's  people 
stared  at  them  ;  and  thought  it  very  clever,  but  very  wrong ; 
and  on  they  went,  in  their  own  way,  and  said  nothing.  Then 
the  little  Gothic  spirits  were  terribly  provoked  because  they 
could  not  spoil  the  shape  of  the  pyramid  ;  and  they  sat  down 
all  along  the  ledges  of  it  to  make  faces  ;  but  that  did  no  good. 
Then  they  ran  to  the  corners,  and  put  their  elbows  on  their 
knees,  and  stuck  themselves  out  as  far  as  they  could,  and 
made  more  faces  ;  but  that  did  no  good,  neither.  Then  they 
looked  up  to  the  sky,  and  opened  their  mouths  wide,  and 
gobbled,  and  said  it  was  too  hot  for  work,  and  wondered 


108 


THE  ETHICS  OF  THE  DUST. 


when  it  would  rain  ;  but  that  did  no  good,  neither.  And  all 
the  while  the  Egyptian  spirits  were  laying  step  above  step, 
patiently.  But  when  the  Gothic  ones  looked,  and  saw  how 
high  they  had  got,  they  said,  '  Ach,  Himmel ! '  and  flew  down 
in  a  great  black  cluster  to  the  bottom  ;  and  swept  out  a  level 
spot  in  the  sand  with  their  wings,  in  no  time,  and  began 
building  a  tower  straight  up,  as  fast  as  they  could.  And 
the  Egyptians  stood  still  again  to  stare  at  them  ;  for  the 
Gothic  spirits  had  got  quite  into  a  passion,  and  were  really 
working  very  wonderfully.  They  cut  the  sandstone  into 
strips  as  fine  as  reeds  ;  and  put  one  reed  on  the  top  of  another, 
so  that  you  could  not  see  where  they  fitted  :  and  they  twisted 
them  in  and  out  like  basket  work,  and  knotted  them  into 
likenesses  of  ugly  faces,  and  of  strange  beasts  biting  each 
other  ;  and  up  they  went,  and  up  still,  and  they  made  spiral 
staircases  at  the  corners,  for  the  loaded  workers  to  come  up  by 
(for  I  saw  they  were  but  weak  imps,  and  could  not  fly  with 
stones  on  their  backs),  and  then  they  made  traceried  galleries 
for  them  to  run  round  by ;  and  so  up  again  ;  with  finer  and  finer 
work,  till  the  Egyptians  wondered  whether  they  meant  the 
thing  for  a  tower  or  a  pillar  :  and  I  heard  them  saying  to  one 
another,  *  It  was  nearly  as  pretty  as  lotus  stalks  ;  and  if  it 
were  not  for  the  ugly  faces,  there  would  be  a  fine  temple,  if 
they  were  going  to  build  it  all  with  pillars  as  big  as  that ! ' 
But  in  a  minute  afterwards, — just  as  the  Gothic  spirits  had 
carried  their  work  as  high  as  the  upper  course,  but  three  or 
four,  of  the  pyramid — the  Egyptians  called  out  to  them  to 
'  mind  what  they  were  about,  for  the  sand  was  running  away 
from  under  one  of  their  tower  corners.'  But  it  was  too  late 
to  mind  what  they  were  about ;  for,  in  another  instant,  the 
whole  tower  sloped  aside  ;  and  the  Gothic  imps  rose  out  of 
it  like  a  flight  of  puffins,  in  a  single  cloud ;  but  screaming 
worse  than  any  puffins  you  ever  heard  :  and  down  came  the 
tower,  all  in  a  piece,  like  a  falling  poplar,  with  its  head  right 
on  the  flank  of  the  pyramid  ;  against  which  it  snapped  short 
off.    And  of  course  that  waked  me  ! 

Mary.  What  a  shame  of  you  to  have  such  a  dream,  after  aD 
you  have  told  us  about  Gothic  architecture ! 


CRYSTAL  CAPRICE. 


109 


L.  If  you  have  understood  anything  I  ever  told  you  about 
it,  you  know  that  no  architecture  was  ever  corrupted  more 
miserably  ;  or  abolished  more  justly  by  the  accomplishment 
of  its  own  follies.  Besides,  even  in  its  days  of  power,  it  was 
subject  to  catastrophes  of  this  kind.  I  have  stood  too  often, 
mourning,  by  the  grand  fragment  of  the  apse  of  Beauvais,  not 
to  have  that  fact  well  burnt  into  me.  Still,  you  must  have 
seen,  surely,  that  these  imps  were  of  the  Flamboyant  school ; 
or,  at  least,  of  the  German  schools  correspondent  with  it  in 
extravagance. 

Mary.  But,  then,  where  is  the  crystal  about  which  you 
dreamed  all  this  ? 

L.  Here  ;  but  I  suppose  little  Pthah  has  touched  it  again, 
for  it  is  very  small.  But,  you  see,  here  is  the  pyramid,  built 
of  great  square  stones  of  fluor  spar,  straight  up  ;  and  here  are 
the  three  little  pinnacles  of  mischievous  quartz,  which  have 
set  themselves,  at  the  same  time,  on  the  same  foundation  ; 
only  they  lean  like  the  tower  of  Pisa,  and  come  out  obliquely 
at  the  side  :  and  here  is  one  great  spire  of  quartz  which  seems 
as  if  it  had  been  meant  to  stand  straight  up,  a  little  way  off ; 
and  then  had  fallen  down  against  the  pyramid  base,  breaking 
its  pinnacle  away.  In  reality,  it  has  crystallised  horizontally, 
and  terminated  imperfectly  :  but,  then,  by  what  caprice  does 
one  crystal  form  horizontally,  when  all  the  rest  stand  upright  ? 
But  this  is  nothing  to  the  phantasies  of  fluor,  and  quartz,  and 
some  other  such  companions,  when  they  get  leave  to  do  any- 
thing they  like.  I  could  show  you  fifty  specimens,  about 
every  one  of  which  you  might  fancy  a  new  fairy  tale.  Not 
that,  in  truth,  any  crystals  get  leave  to  do  quite  what  they 
like  ;  and  many  of  them  are  sadly  tried,  and  have  little  time 
for  caprices — poor  things  ! 

Mary.  I  thought  they  always  looked  as  if  they  were  either 
in  play  or  in  mischief  !    What  trials  have  they  ? 

L.  Trials  much  like  our  own.  Sickness,  and  starvation  ; 
fevers,  and  agues,  and  palsy  ;  oppression  ;  and  old  age,  and 
the  necessity  of  passing  away  in  their  time,  like  all  else.  If 
there's  any  pity  in  you,  you  must  come  to-morrow,  and  take 
some  part  in  these  crystal  griefs. 


110 


THE  ETHICS  OF  THE  DUST. 


Dora.  I  am  sure  we  shall  cry  till  our  eyes  are  red. 

L.  Ah,  you  may  laugh,  Dora :  but  I've  been  made  grave, 
not  once,  nor  twice,  to  see  that  even  crystals  '  cannot  choose 
but  be  old '  at  last.  It  may  be  but  a  shallow  proverb  of  the 
Justice's  ;  but  it  is  a  shrewdly  wide  one. 

Dora  [pensive,  for  once).  I  suppose  it  is  very  dreadful  to 
be  old  !  But  then  (brightening  again),  what  should  we  do 
without  our  dear  old  friends,  and  our  nice  old  lecturers  ? 

L.  If  all  nice  old  lecturers  were  minded  as  little  as  one  I 
know  of  

Dora.  And  if  they  all  meant  as  little  what  they  say,  would 
they  not  deserve  it  ?    But  we'll  come — we'll  come,  and  cry. 


LECTURE  IX. 


CRYSTAL  SORROWS. 
Working  Lecture  in  Schoolroom. 

L.  We  have  been  hitherto  talking,  children,  as  if  crystals 
might  live,  and  play,  and  quarrel,  and  behave  ill  or  well, 
according  to  their  characters,  without  interruption  from  any- 
thing else.  But  so  far  from  this  being  so,  nearly  all  crystals, 
whatever  their  characters,  have  to  live  a  hard  life  of  it.  and 
meet  with  many  misfortunes.  If  we  could  see  far  enough, 
we  should  find,  indeed,  that,  at  the  root,  all  their  vices  were 
misfortunes :  but  to-day  I  want  you  to  see  what  sort  of 
troubles  the  best  crystals  have  to  go  through,  occasionally, 
by  no  fault  of  their  own. 

This  black  thing,  which  is  one  of  the  prettiest  of  the  very 
few  pretty  black  things  in  the  world,  is  called  '  Tourmaline.' 
It  may  be  transparent,  and  green,  or  red,  as  well  as  black ; 
and  then  no  stone  can  be  prettier  (only,  all  the  light  that 
gets  into  it,  I  believe,  comes  out  a  good  deal  the  worse  ;  and 
is  not  itself  again  for  a  long  while).  But  this  is  the  com- 
monest state  of  it, — opaque,  and  as  black  as  jet. 

Mary.    What  does  '  Tourmaline  '  mean? 

L.  They  say  it  is  Ceylanese,  and  I  don't  know  Ceylanese  ; 
but  we  may  always  be  thankful  for  a  graceful  word,  whatever 
it  means. 

Mary.  And  what  is  it  made  of  ? 

L.  A  little  of  everything  ;  there's  always  flint,  and  clay,  and 
magnesia  in  it ;  and  the  black  is  iron,  according  to  its  fancy  ; 
and  there's  boracic  acid,  if  you  know  what  that  is ;  and  if 
you  don't,  I  cannot  tell  you  to-day  ;  and  it  doesn't  signify ; 
and  there's  potash,  and  soda ;  and,  on  the  whole,  the  chem- 
istry of  it  is  more  like  a  mediaeval  doctor's  prescription,  than 


112 


THE  ETHICS  OF  THE  DUST. 


the  making  of  a  respectable  mineral :  but  it  may,  perhaps,  be 
owing  to  the  strange  complexity  of  its  make,  that  it  has  a 
notable  habit  which  makes  it,  to  me,  one  of  the  most  inter- 
esting of  minerals.  You  see  these  two  crystals  are  broken 
right  across,  in  many  places,  just  as  if  they  had  been  shafts 
of  black  marble  fallen  from  a  ruinous  temple  ;  and  here  they 
lie,  imbedded  in  white  quartz,  fragment  succeeding  fragment, 
keeping  the  line  of  the  original  crystal,  while  the  quartz  fills 
up  the  intervening  spaces.  Now  tourmaline  has  a  trick  of 
doing  this,  more  than  any  other  mineral  I  know  :  here  is 
another  bit  which  I  picked  up  on  the  glacier  of  Macugnaga ; 
it  is  broken,  like  a  pillar  built  of  very  fiat  broad  stones,  into 
about  thirty  joints,  and  all  these  are  heaved  and  warped  away 
from  each  other  sideways,  almost  into  a  line  of  steps ;  and 
then  all  is  filled  up  with  quartz  paste.  And  here,  lastly,  is  a 
green  Indian  piece,  in  which  the  pillar  is  first  disjointed,  and 
then  wrung  round  into  the  shape  of  an  S. 
Mary.  How  can  this  have  been  done  ? 

L.  There  are  a  thousand  ways  in  which  it  may  have  been 
done  ;  the  difficulty  is  not  to  account  for  the  doing  of  it ;  but 
for  the  showing  of  it  in  some  crystals,  and  not  in  others.  You 
never  by  any  chance  get  a  quartz  crystal  broken  or  twisted  in 
this  way.  If  it  break  or  twist  at  all,  which  it  does  sometimes, 
like  the  spire  of  Dijon,  it  is  by  its  own  will  or  fault ;  it  never 
seems  to  have  been  passively  crushed.  But,  for  the  forces 
which  cause  this  passive  ruin  of  the  tourmaline, —here  is  a 
stone  which  will  show  you  multitudes  of  them  in  operation 
at  once.  It  is  known  as  'brecciated  agate,'  beautiful,  as  yon 
see  ;  and  highly  valued  as  a  pebble  :  yet,  so  far  as  I  can  read 
or  hear,  no  one  has  ever  looked  at  it  with  the  least  attention. 
At  the  first  glance,  ^ou  see  it  is  made  of  very  fine  red  striped 
agates,  which  have  been  broken  into  small  pieces,  and  fast- 
ened together  again  by  paste,  also  of  agate.  There  would  be 
nothing  wonderful  in  this,  if  this  were  all.  It  is  well  known 
that  by  the  movements  of  strata,  portions  of  rock  are  often 
shattered  to  pieces  : — well  known  also  that  agate  is  a  deposit 
of  flint  by  water  under  certain  conditions  of  heat  and  press- 
ure :  there  is,  therefore,  nothing  wonderful  in  an  agate's 


CRYSTAL  SORROWS. 


113 


being  broken  ;  and  nothing  wonderful  in  its  being  mended 
with  the  solution  out  of  which  it  was  itself  originally  con- 
gealed. And  with  this  explanation,  most  people,  looking  at 
a  brecciated  agate,  or  brecciated  anything,  seem  to  be  satis- 
fied. I  was  so  myself,  for  twenty  years  ;  but,  lately  happening 
to  stay  for  some  time  at  the  Swiss  Baden,  where  the  beach  of 
the  Limmat  is  almost  wholly  composed  of  brecciated  lime- 
stones, I  began  to  examine  them  thoughtfully  ;  and  perceived, 
in  the  end,  that  they  were,  one  and  all,  knots  of  as  rich  mystery 
as  any  poor  little  human  brain  was  ever  lost  in.  That  piece  of 
agate  in  your  hand,  Mary,  will  show  you  many  of  the  common 
phenomena  of  breccias  ;  but  you  need  not  knit  your  brows 
over  it  in  that  way  ;  depend  upon  it,  neither  you  nor  I  shall 
ever  know  anything  about  the  way  it  was  made,  as  long  as  we 
live. 

Dora.  That  does  not  seem  much  to  depend  upon. 

L.  Pardon  me,  puss.  When  once  we  gain  some  real  notion 
of  the  extent  and  the  unconquerableness  of  our  ignorance, 
it  is  a  very  broad  and  restful  thing  to  depend  upon  :  you 
can  throw  yourself  upon  it  at  ease,  as  on  a  cloud,  to  feast 
with  the  gods.  You  do  not  thenceforward  trouble  yourself, 
— nor  any  one  else, — with  theories,  or  the  contradiction  of 
theories ;  you  neither  get  headache  nor  heartburning ;  and 
you  never  more  waste  your  poor  little  store  of  strength,  or 
allowance  of  time. 

However,  there  are  certain  facts,  about  this  agate-making, 
which  I  can  tell  you ;  and  then  you  may  look  at  it  in  a 
pleasant  wonder  as  long  as  you  like ;  pleasant  wonder  is  no 
loss  of  time. 

First,  then,  it  is  not  broken  freely  by  a  blow  ;  it  is  slowly 
wrung,  or  ground,  to  pieces.  You  can  only  with  extreme 
dimness  conceive  the  force  exerted  on  mountains  in  transi- 
tional states  of  movement.  You  have  all  read  a  little  geol- 
ogy ;  and  you  know  how  coolly  geologists  talk  of  mountains 
being  raised  or  depressed.  They  talk  coolly  of  it,  because 
they  are  accustomed  to  the  fact ;  but  the  very  universality  of 
the  fact  prevents  us  from  ever  conceiving  distinctly  the  con 
ditions  of  force  involved.    You  know  I  was  living  last  year 


114 


THE  ETHICS  OF  THE  DUST. 


in  Savoy  ;  my  house  was  on  the  back  of  a  sloping  mountain, 
which  rose  gradually  for  two  miles,  behind  it ;  and  then  fell 
at  once  in  a  great  precipice  towards  Geneva,  going  down  three 
thousand  feet  in  four  or  five  cliffs,  or  steps.  Now  that  whole 
group  of  cliffs  had  simply  been  torn  away  by  sheer  strength 
from  the  rocks  below,  as  if  the  whole  mass  had  been  as  soft 
as  biscuit.  Put  four  or  five  captains'  biscuits  on  the  floor,  on 
the  top  of  one  another  ;  and  try  to  break  them  all  in  half,  not 
by  bending,  but  by*  holding  one  half  down,  and  tearing  the 
other  halves  straight  up  ; — of  course  you  will  not  be  able  to  do 
it,  but  you  will  feel  and  comprehend  the  sort  of  force  needed. 
Then,  fancy  each  captains'  biscuit  a  bed  of  rock,  six  or 
seven  hundred  feet  thick ;  and  the  whole  mass  torn  straight 
through ;  and  one  half  heaved  up  three  thousand  feet,  grind- 
ing against  the  other  as  it  rose, — and  you  will  have  some  idea 
of  the  making  of  the  Mont  Saleve. 

May.  But  it  must  crush  the  rocks  all  to  dust ! 

L.  No  ;  for  there  is  no  room  for  dust.  The  pressure  is  too 
great ;  probably  the  heat  developed  also  so  great  that  the 
rock  is  made  partly  ductile ;  but  the  worst  of  it  is,  that  we 
never  can  see  these  parts  of  mountains  in  the  state  they  were 
left  in  at  the  time  of  their  elevation ;  for  it  is  precisely  in 
these  rents  and  dislocations  that  the  crystalline  power  prin- 
cipally exerts  itself.  It  is  essentially  a  styptic  power,  and 
wherever  the  earth  is  torn,  it  heals  and  binds  ;  nay,  the  tort- 
ure and  grieving  of  the  earth  seem  necessary  to  bring  out 
its  full  energy  ;  for  you  only  find  the  crystalline  living  power 
fully  in  action,  where  the  rents  and  faults  are  deep  and  many. 

Dora.  If  you  please,  sir, — would  you  tell  us — what  are 
faults'? 

L.  You  never  heard  of  such  things  ? 
Dora.  Never  in  all  our  lives. 

L.  When  a  vein  of  rock  which  is  going  on  smoothly,  is  in- 
terrupted by  another  troublesome  little  vein,  which  stops  it, 
and  puts  it  out,  so  that  it  has  to  begin  again  in  another  place 
■ — that  is  called  a  fault.  I  always  think  it  ought  to  be  called 
the  fault  of  the  vein  that  interrupts  it ;  but  the  miners  always 
call  it  the  fault  of  the  vein  that  is  interrupted, 


CRYSTAL  SORROWS. 


115 


Dora.  So  it  is,  if  it  does  not  begin  again  where  it  left  off 

L.  Well,  that  is  certainly  the  gist  of  the  business :  but, 
whatever  good-natured  old  lecturers  may  do,  the  rocks  have  a 
bad  habit,  when  they  are  once  interrupted,  of  never  asking 
'  Where  was  I  ? ' 

Doea0  When  the  two  halves  of  the  dining  table  came  sepa- 
rate, yesterday,  was  that  a  c  fault '  ? 

L.  Yes  ;  but  not  the  table's..  However,  it  is  not  a  bad  illus- 
tration, Dora.  When  beds  of  rock  are  only  interrupted  by  a 
fissure,  but  remain  at  the  same  level,  like  the  two  halves  of  the 
table,  it  is  not  called  a  fault,  but  only  a  fissure  ;  but  if  one  half 
of  the  table  be  either  tilted  higher  than  the  other,  or  pushed 
to  the  side,  so  that  the  two  parts  will  not  fit,  it  is  a  fault. 
You  had  better  read  the  chapter  on  faults  in  Jukes's  Geology  ; 
then  you  will  know  all  about  it.  And  this  rent  that  I  am  tell- 
ing you  of  in  the  Saleve,  is  one  only  of  myriads,  to  which  are 
owing  the  forms  of  the  Alps,  as,  I  believe,  of  all  great  moun- 
tain chains.  Wherever  you  see  a  precipice  on  any  scale  of. 
real  magnificence,  you  will  nearly  always  find  it  owing  to  some 
dislocation  of  this  kind  ;  but  the  point  of  chief  wonder  to  me, 
is  the  delicacy  of  the  touch  by  which  these  gigantic  rents  have 
been  apparently  accomplished.  Note,  however,  that  we  have 
no  clear  evidence,  hitherto,  of  the  time  taken  to  produce  any 
of  them.  We  know  that  a  change  of  temperature  alters  the  po- 
sition and  the  angles  of  the  atoms  of  crystals,  and  also  the 
entire  bulk  of  rocks.  We  know  that  in  all  volcanic,  and  the 
greater  part  of  all  subterranean,  action,  temperatures  are  con- 
tinually changing,  and  therefore  masses  of  rock  must  be  ex- 
panding or  contracting,  with  infinite  slowness,  but  with  in- 
finite force.  This  pressure  must  result  in  mechanical  strain 
somewhere,  both  in  their  own  substance,  and  in  that  of  the 
rocks  surrounding  them  ;  and  we  can  form  no  conception  of 
the  result  of  irresistible  pressure,  applied  so  as  to  rend  and 
raise,  with  imperceptible  slowness  of  gradation,  masses 
thousands  of  feet  in  thickness.  We  want  some  experiments 
tried  on  masses  of  iron  and  stone  ;  and  we  can't  get  them 
tried,  because  Christian  creatures  never  will  seriously  and 
sufficiently  spend  money,  except  to  find  out  the  shortest  ways 


116 


THE  ETHICS  OF  THE  LUST. 


of  killing  each  other.  But,  besides  this  slow  kind  of  press- 
ure, there  is  evidence  of  more  or  less  sudden  violence,  on  the 
sapae  terrific  scale  ;  and,  through  it  all,  the  wonder,  as  I  said, 
is  always  to  me  the  delicacy  of  touch.  I  cut  a  block  of  the 
Saleve  limestone  from  the  edge  of  one  of  the  principal  faults 
which  have  formed  the  precipice  ;  it  is  a  lovely  compact  lime 
stone,  and  the  fault  itself  is  filled  up  with  a  red  breccia5 
formed  of  the  crushed  fragments  of  the  torn  rock,  cemented 
by  a  rich  red  crystalline  paste.  I  have  had  the  piece  I  cut 
from  it  smoothed,  and  polished  across  the  junction  ;  here  it 
is  ;  and  you  may  now  pass  your  soft  little  fingers  over  the 
surface,  without  so  much  as  feeling  the  place  where  a  rock 
which  all  the  hills  of  England  might  have  been  sunk  in  the 
body  of,  and  not  a  summit  seen,  was  torn  asunder  through 
that  whole  thickness,  as  a  thin  dress  is  torn  when  you  tread 
upon  it. 

{The  audience  examine  the  stone,  and  touch  it  timidly  ;  but 
the  matter  remains  inconceivable  to  them.) 

Mary  {struck  by  the  beauty  of  the  stone).  But  this  is  almost 
marble  ? 

L.  It  is  quite  marble.  And  another  singular  point  in  the 
business,  to  my  mind,  is  that  these  stones,  which  men  have 
been  cutting  into  slabs,  for  thousands  of  years,  to  ornament 
their  principal  buildings  with, — and  which,  under  the  general 
name  of  '  marble/  have  been  the  delight  of  the  eyes,  and  the 
wealth  of  architecture,  among  all  civilised  nations, — are  pre- 
cisely those  on  which  the  signs  and  brands  of  these  earth- 
agonies  have  been  chiefly  struck ;  and  there  is  not  a  purple 
vein  nor  flaming  zone  in  them,  which  is  not  the  record  of 
their  ancient  torture.  What  a  boundless  capacity  for  sleep, 
and  for  serene  stupidity,  there  is  in  the  human  mind !  Fancy 
reflective  beings,  who  cut  and  polish  stones  for  three  thousand 
years,  for  the  sake  of  the  pretty  stains  upon  them  ;  and  edu- 
cate themselves  to  an  art  at  last  (such  as  it  is),  of  imitating 
these  veins  by  dexterous  painting  ;  and  never  a  curious  sou] 
of  them,  all  that  while,  asks,  '  What  painted  the  rocks  ? ' 

{The  audience  look  dejected,  and  ashamed  of  themselves.) 


CRYSTAL  SORROWS. 


117 


The  iact  is,  we  are  all,  and  always,  asleep,  through  our 
lives  ;  and  it  is  only  by  pinching  ourselves  very  hard  that  we 
ever  come  to  see,  or  understand,  anything.  At  least,  it  is  not 
always  we  who  pinch  ourselves ;  sometimes  other  people 
pinch  us  ;  which  I  suppose  is  ver}7  good  of  them, — or  other 
things,  which  I  suppose  is  very  proper  of  them.  But  it  is  a 
sad  life  ;  made  up  chiefly  of  naps  and  pinches. 

(Some  of  the  audience,  on  this,  appearing  to  think  that  the 
others  require  pinching,  the  Lecturer  changes  the  subject.) 

Now,  however,  for  once,  look  at  a  piece  of  marble  care- 
fully, and  think  about  it.  You  see  this  is  one  side  of  the 
fault ;  the  other  side  is  down  or  up,  nobody  knows  where  ; 
but,  on  this  side,  you  can  trace  the  evidence  of  the  dragging 
and  tearing  action.  All  along  the  edge  of  this  marble,  the 
ends  of  the  fibres  of  the  rock  are  torn,  here  an  inch,  and  there 
half  an  inch,  away  from  each  other ;  and  you  see  the  exact 
places  where  they  fitted,  before  they  were  torn  separate  ;  and 
you  see  the  rents  are  now  all  filled  up  with  the  sanguine  paste, 
fall  of  the  broken  pieces  of  the  rock  ;  the  paste  itself  seems 
to  have  been  half  melted,  and  partly  to  have  also  melted  the 
edge  of  the  fragments  it  contains,  and  then  to  have  crystal- 
lised with  them,  and  round  them.  And  the  brecciated  agate 
I  first  showed  you  contains  exactly  the  same  phenomena  ; 
a  zoned  crystallisation  going  on  amidst  the  cemented  frag- 
ments, partly  altering  the  structure  of  those  fragments  them- 
selves, and  subject  to  continual  change,  either  in  the  intensity 
of  its  own  power,  or  in  the  nature  of  the  materials  submitted 
to  it ; — so  that,  at  one  time,  gravity  acts  upon  them,  and  dis- 
poses them  in  horizontal  layers,  or  causes  them  to  droop  in 
stalactites  ;  and  at  another,  gravity  is  entirely  defied,  and 
the  substances  in  solution  are  crystallised  in  bands  of  equal 
thickness  on  every  side  of  the  cell.  It  would  require  a  course 
of  lectures  longer  than  these  (I  have  a  great  mind, — you  have 
behaved  so  saucily — to  stay  and  give  them)  to  describe  to 
you  the  phenomena  of  this  kind,  in  agates  and  chalcedonies 
only  ; — nay,  there  is  a  single  sarcophagus  in  the  British  Mu- 
seum, covered  with  grand  sculpture  of  the  18th  dynasty. 


iLS 


THE  ETHICS  OF  THE  DUST. 


which  contains  in  the  magnificent  breccia  (agates  and  jaspers 
imbedded  in  porphyry),  out  of  which  it  is  hewn,  material  for 
the  thought  of  years  ;  and  record  of  the  earth-sorrow  of  ages 
in  comparison  with  the  duration  of  which,  the  Egyptian  let- 
ters tell  us  but  the  history  of  the  evening  and  morning  of  a 
day. 

Agates,  I  think,  of  all  stones,  confess  most  of  their  past 
history  ;  but  all  crystallisation  goes  on  under,  and  partly 
records,  circumstances  of  this  kind — circumstances  of  infinite 
variety,  but  always  involving  difficulty,  interruption,  and 
change  of  condition  at  different  times.  Observe,  first,  you 
have  the  whole  mass  of  the  rock  in  motion,  either  contracting 
itself,  and  so  gradually  widening  the  cracks ;  or  being  com- 
pressed, and  thereby  closing  them,  and  crushing  their  edges ; 
— and,  if  one  part  of  its  substance  be  softer,  at  the  given  tem- 
perature, than  another,  probably  squeezing  that  softer  sub- 
stance out  into  the  veins.  Then  the  veins  themselves,  when 
the  rock  leaves  them  open  by  its  contraction,  act  with  various 
power  of  suction  upon  its  substance  ; — by  capillary  attraction 
when  they  are  fine, — by  that  of  pure  vacuity  when  they  are 
larger,  or  by  changes  in  the  constitution  and  condensation  of 
the  mixed  gases  with  which  they  have  been  originally  filled. 
Those  gases  themselves  may  be  supplied  in  all  variation  of 
volume  and  power  from  below  ;  or,  slowly,  by  the  decompo- 
sition of  the  rocks  themselves  ;  and,  at  changing  temperatures, 
must  exert  relatively  changing  forces  of  decomposition  and 
combination  on  the  walls  of  the  veins  they  fill ;  while  water, 
at  every  degree  of  heat  and  pressure  (from  beds  of  everlasting 
ice,  alternate  with  cliffs  of  native  rock,  to  volumes  of  red  hot, 
or  white  hot,  steam),  congeals,  and  drips,  and  throbs,  and 
thrills,  from  crag  to  crag  ;  and  breathes  from  pulse  to  pulse 
of  foaming  or  fiery  arteries,  whose  beating  is  felt  through 
chains  of  the  great  islands  of  the  Indian  seas,  as  your  own 
pulses  lift  your  bracelets,  and  makes  whole  kingdoms  of  the 
world  quiver  in  deadly  earthquake,  as  if  they  were  light  as 
aspen  leaves.  And,  remember,  the  poor  little  crystals  have  to 
live  their  lives,  and  mind  their  own  affairs,  in  the  midst  of  all 
this,  as  best  they  may.    They  are  wonderfully  like  human 


CRYSTAL  SORROWS. 


119 


creatures, — forget  all  that  is  going  on  if  they  don't  see  it,  how* 
ever  dreadful ;  and  never  think  what  is  to  happen  to-morrow. 
They  are  spiteful  or  loving,  and  indolent  or  painstaking,  and 
orderly  or  licentious,  with  no  thought  whatever  of  the  lava  or 
the  flood  which  may  break  over  them  any  day  ;  and  evaporate 
them  into  air-bubbles,  or  wash  them  into  a  solution  of  salts. 
And  you  may  look  at  them,  once  understanding  the  surround- 
ing conditions  of  their  fate,  with  an  endless  interest.  You 
will  see  crowds  of  unfortunate  little  crystals,  who  have  been 
forced  to  constitute  themselves  in  a  hurry,  their  dissolving 
element  being  fiercely  scorched  away  ;  you  will  see  them  doing 
their  best,  bright  and  numberless,  but  tiny.  Then  you  will 
find  indulged  crystals,  who  have  had  centuries  to  form  them* 
selves  in,  and  have  changed  their  mind  and  ways  continually  ; 
and  have  been  tired,  and  taken  heart  again  ;  and  have  been 
sick,  and  got  well  again  ;  and  thought  they  would  try  a  differ- 
ent diet,  and  then  thought  better  of  it ;  and  made  but  a  poor 
use  of  their  advantages,  after  all.  And  others  you  will  see, 
who  have  begun  life  as  wicked  crystals  ;  and  then  have  been 
impressed  by  alarming  circumstances,  and  have  become  con- 
verted crystals,  and  behaved  amazingly  for  a  little  while,  and 
fallen  away  again,  and  ended,  but  discreditably,  perhaps  even 
in  decomposition  ;  so  that  one  doesn't  know  what  will  become 
of  them.  And  sometimes  you  will  see  deceitful  crystals,  that 
look  as  soft  as  velvet,  and  are  deadly  to  all  near  them  ;  and 
sometimes  you  will  see  deceitful  crystals,  that  seem  flint-edged, 
like  our  little  quartz-crystal  of  a  housekeeper  here,  (hush ! 
Dora,)  and  are  endlessly  gentle  and  true  wherever  gentleness 
and  truth  are  needed.  And  sometimes  you  will  see  little 
child-crystals  put  to  school  like  school-girls,  and  made  to  stand 
in  rows  ;  and  taken  the  greatest  care  of,  and  taught  how  to 
hold  themselves  up,  and  behave  :  and  sometimes  you  will  see 
unhappy  little  child-crystals  left  to  lie  about  in  the  dirt,  and 
pick  up  their  living,  and  learn  manners,  where  they  can.  And 
sometimes  you  will  see  fat  crystals  eating  up  thin  ones,  like 
great  capitalists  and  little  labourers ;  and  politico-economic  crys- 
tals teaching  the  stupid  ones  how  to  eat  each  other,  and  cheat 
each  other ;  and  foolish  crystals  getting  in  the  way  of  wise 


120 


THE  ETHICS  OF  THE  BUST 


ones ;  and  impatient  crystals  spoiling  the  plans  of  patient 
ones,  irreparably  ;  just  aa  things  go  on  in  the  world.  And 
sometimes  you  may  see  hypocritical  crystals  taking  the  shape 
of  others,  though  they  are  nothing  like  in  their  minds  ;  and 
vampire  crystals  eating  out  the  hearts  of  others  ;  and  hermit- 
crab  crystals  living  in  the  shells  of  others  ;  and  parasite  crys  ■ 
tals  living  on  the  means  of  others  ;  and  courtier  crystals  glit- 
tering in  attendance  upon  others  ;  and  all  these,  besides  the 
two  great  companies  of  war  and  peace,  who  ally  themselves, 
resolutely  to  attack,  or  resolutely  to  defend.  And  for  the 
close,  you  see  the  broad  shadow  and  deadly  force  of  inevitable 
fate,  above  all  this :  you  see  the  multitudes  of  crystals  wThose 
time  has  come  ;  not  a  set  time,  as  with  us,  but  yet  a  time, 
sooner  or  later,  when  they  all  must  give  up  their  crystal  ghosts : 
■ — when  the  strength  by  which  they  grew,  and  the  breath  given 
them  to  breathe,  pass  away  from  them  ;  and  they  fail,  and 
are  consumed,  and  vanish  away ;  and  another  generation  is 
brought  to  life,  framed  out  of  their  ashes. 

Mary.  It  is  very  terrible.  Is  it  not  the  complete  fulfilment, 
down  into  the  very  dust,  of  that  verse  :  '  The  whole  creation 
groaneth  and  travaileth  in  pain '  ? 

L.  I  do  not  know  that  it  is  in  pain,  Mary  :  at  least,  the 
evidence  tends  to  show  that  there  is  much  more  pleasure  than 
pain,  as  soon  as  sensation  becomes  possible. 

Luctlla.  But  then,  surely,  if  we  are  told  that  it  is  pain,  it 
must  be  pain  ? 

L.  Yes  ;  if  wre  are  told  ;  and  told  in  the  way  you  mean, 
Luciila  ;  but  nothing  is  said  of  the  proportion  to  pleasure. 
Unmitigated  pain  would  kill  any  of  us  in  a  few  hours  ;  pain 
equal  to  our  pleasures  would  make  us  loathe  life  ;  the  word 
itself  cannot  be  applied  to  the  lower  conditions  of  matter,  in 
its  ordinary  sense.  But  wait  till  to-morrow  to  ask  me  about 
this.  To-morrow  is  to  be  kept  for  questions  and  difficulties  ; 
let  us  keep  to  the  plain  facts  to-day.  There  is  yet  one  group 
of  facts  connected  with  this  rending  of  the  rocks,  which  I 
especially  want  you  to  notice.  You  know,  when  you  have 
mended  a  very  old  dress,  quite  meritoriously,  till  it  won't 
mend  any  more  


VUTSTAL  SORROWS. 


121 


Egypt  {interrupting).  Could  not  you  sometimes  take  gen* 
ilemen's  work  to  illustrate  by  ? 

L.  Gentlemen's  work  is  rarely  so  useful  as  yours,  Egypt ; 
and  when  it  is  useful,  girls  cannot  easily  understand  it. 

Dora.  I  am  sure  we  should  understand  it  better  than  gen- 
tlemen understand  about  sewing. 

L.  My  dear,  I  hope  I  always  speak  modestly,  and  under 
correction,  when  I  touch  upon  matters  of  the  kind  too  high 
for  me  ;  and  besides,  I  never  intend  to  speak  otherwise  than 
respectfully  of  sewing  ; — though  you  alwavs  seem  to  think  I 
am  laughing  at  you.  In  all  seriousness,  illustrations  from 
sewing  are  those  which  Neith  likes  me  best  to  use  ;  and  which 
young  ladies  ought  to  like  everybody  to  use.  What  do  you 
think  the  beautiful  word  '  wife 9  comes  from  ? 

Dora  (tossi?ig  her  head).  I  don't  think  it  is  a  particularly 
beautiful  word. 

L.  Perhaps  not.  At  your  ages  you  may  think  '  bride  * 
Bounds  better  ;  but  wife's  the  word  for  wear,  depend  upon  it. 
It  is  the  great  word  in  which  the  EDglish  and  Latin  languages 
conquer  the  French  and  the  Greek.  I  hope  the  French  will 
some  day  get  a  word  for  it,  yet,  instead  of  their  dreadful 
1  femme.'    But  what  do  you  think  it  comes  from  ? 

Dora.  I  never  did  think  about  it. 

L.  Nor  you,  Sibyl  ? 

Sibyl.  No  ;  I  thought  it  was  Saxon,  and  stopped  there. 

L.  Yes ;  but  the  great  good  of  Saxon  words  is,  that  they 
usually  do  mean  something.  "Wife  means  'weaver.'  You 
have  all  the  right  to  call  yourselves  little  'housewives,'  when 
you  sew  neatly. 

Dora.  But  I  don't  think  we  want  to  call  ourselves  'little 
housewives.' 

L.  You  must  either  be  house-Wives,  or  house-Moths  ;  re- 
member that.  In  the  deep  sense,  you  must  either  weave 
men's  fortunes,  and  embroider  them  ;  or  feed  upon,  and  bring 
them  to  decay.  You  had  better  let  me  keep  my  sewing  illus* 
tration,  and  help  me  out  with  it. 

Dora.  Well  wTe'll  hear  it,  under  protest. 

L,  You  have  heard  it  before  ;  but  with  reference  to  other 


122 


THE  ETHICS  OF  THE  DUST. 


matters.  When  it  is  said,  '  no  man  putteth  a  piece  of  new 
cloth  on  an  old  garment,  else  it  taketh  from  the  old/  does  it 
not  mean  that  the  new  piece  tears  the  old  one  away  at  the 

sewn  edge  ? 

Dora.  Yes ;  certainly. 

L.  And  when  you  mend  a  decayed  stuff  with  strong  thread, 
does  not  the  whole  edge  come  away  sometimes,  when  it  tears 
again  ? 

Dora.  Yes ;  and  then  it  is  of  no  use  to  mend  it  any  more. 

L.  Well,  the  rocks  don't  seem  to  think  that :  but  the  same 
thing  happens  to  them  continually.  I  told  you  they  were  full 
of  rents,  or  veins.  Large  masses  of  mountain  are  sometimes 
as  full  of  veins  as  your  hand  is  ;  and  of  veins  nearly  as  fine 
(only  you  know  a  rock  vein  does  not  mean  a  tube,  but  a  crack 
or  cleft).  Now  these  clefts  are  mended,  usually,  with  the 
strongest  material  the  rock  can  find  ;  and  often  literally  with 
threads  ;  for  the  gradually  opening  rent  seems  to  draw  the 
substance  it  is  filled  with  into  fibres,  which  cross  from  one 
side  of  it  to  the  other,  and  are  partly  crystalline  ;  so  that, 
when  the  crystals  become  distinct,  the  fissure  has  often  ex- 
actly the  look  of  a  tear,  brought  together  with  strong  cross 
stitches.  Now  when  this  is  completely  done,  and  all  has  been 
fastened  and  made  firm,  perhaps  some  new  change  of  tem- 
perature may  occur,  and  the  rock  begin  to  contract  again. 
Then  the  old  vein  must  open,  wider ;  or  else  another  open 
elsewhere.  If  the  old  vein  widen,  it  may  do  so  at  its  centre  ; 
but  it  constantly  happens,  with  well  filled  veins,  that  the 
cross  stitches  are  too  strong  to  break  ;  the  walls  of  the  vein, 
instead,  are  torn  away  by  them  ;  and  another  little  supple- 
mentary vein — often  three  or  four  successively— wrill  be  thus 
formed  at  the  side  of  the  first. 

Mary.  That  is  really  very  much  like  our  work.  But  what 
do  the  mountains  use  to  sew  with  ? 

L.  Quartz,  whenever  they  can  get  it :  pure  limestones  are 
obliged  to  be  content  with  carbonate  of  lime  ;  but  most  mixed 
rocks  can  find  some  quartz  for  themselves.  Here  is  a  piece 
of  black  slate  from  the  Buet :  it  looks  merely  like  dry  dark 
mud  ;— you  could  not  think  there  was  any  quartz  in  it ;  bnt^ 


CRYSTAL  SORROWS. 


123 


you  see,  its  rents  are  all  stitched  together  with  beautiful  white 
thread,  which  is  the  purest  quartz,  so  close  drawn  that  you 
can  break  it  like  flint,  in  the  mass  ;  but,  where  it  has  been  ex- 
posed to  the  weather,  the  fine  fibrous  structure  is  shown : 
and,  more  than  that,  you  see  the  threads  have  been  all  twisted 
and  pulled  aside,  this  way  and  the  other,  by  the  warpings  and 
shifting  of  the  sides  of  the  vein  as  it  widened. 

Mary.  It  is  wonderful !  But  is  that  going  on  still  ?  Are 
the  mountains  being  torn  and  sewn  together  again  at  this 
moment  ? 

L.  Yes,  certainly,  my  dear  :  but  I  think,  just  as  certainly 
(though  geologists  differ  on  this  matter),  not  with  the  violence, 
or  on  the  scale,  of  their  ancient  ruin  and  renewal.  All  things 
seem  to  be  tending  towards  a  condition  of  at  least  temporary 
rest ;  and  that  groaning  and  travailing  of  the  creation,  as,  as- 
suredly, not  wholly  in  pain,  is  not,  in  the  full  sense,  '  until 
now.' 

Mary.  I  want  so  much  to  ask  you  about  that ! 

Sibyl.  Yes  ;  and  we  all  want  to  ask  you  about  a  great  many 
other  things  besides. 

L.  It  seems  to  me  that  you  have  got  quite  as  many  new 
ideas  as  are  good  for  any  of  you  at  present :  and  I  should  not 
like  to  burden  you  with  more  ;  but  I  must  see  that  those  you 
have  are  clear,  if  I  can  make  them  so  ;  so  we  will  have  one 
more  talk,  for  answer  of  questions,  mainly.  Think  over  all 
the  ground,  and  make  your  difficulties  thoroughly  presentable. 
Then  we'll  see  what  we  can  make  of  them. 

Dora.  They  shall  ail  be  dressed  in  their  very  best ;  and 
curtsey  as  they  come  in. 

L.  No,  no,  Dora  ;  no  curtseys,  if  you  please.  I  had  enough 
of  them  the  day  you  all  took  a  fit  of  reverence,  and  curtsied 
me  out  of  the  room. 

Dora.  But,  you  know,  we  cured  ourselves  of  the  fault,  at 
once,  by  that  fit.  We  have  never  been  the  least  respectful 
since.  And  the  difficulties  will  only  curtsey  themselves  out  of 
the  room,  I  hope  ; — come  in  at  one  door — vanish  at  the  other. 

L.  What  a  pleasant  world  it  would  be,  if  all  its  difficulties 
were  taught  to  behave  so  I    However,  one  can  generally  make 


124 


THE  ETHICS  OF  THE  DUST. 


something,  or  (better  still)  nothing,  or  at  least  less,  of  then^ 
if  they  thoroughly  know  their  own  minds  ;  and  your  difficul- 
ties— I  must  say  that  for  you,  children, — generally  do  know 
their  own  minds,  as  you  do  yourselves. 

Dora.  That  is  very  kindly  said  for  us.  Some  people  wrould 
not  allow  so  much  as  that  girls  had  any  minds  to  know. 

L.  They  will  at  least  admit  that  you  have  minds  to  change, 
Dora. 

Mary.  You  might  have  left  us  the  last  speech,  without  a 
retouch.  But  we'll  put  our  little  minds,  such  as  they  are,  in 
the  best  trim  we  can,  for  to-morrow. 


LECTURE  X. 


THE  CRYSTAL  REST. 
Weening.    TJie  fireside.    L's  arm-chair  in  the  comfortablest  corner. 

L.  (perceiving  various  arrangements  being  made  of  foot  stool, 
cushion,  screen,  and  the  like).  Yes,  yes,  it's  all  very  fine  !  and 
I  am  to  sit  here  to  be  asked  questions  till  supper-time,  am  I  ? 

Dora.  I  don't  think  you  can  have  any  supper  to-night : — 
we've  got  so  much  to  ask. 

Lily.  Oh,  Miss  Dora  !  We  can  fetch  it  him  here,  you 
know,  so  nicely ! 

L.  Yes,  Lily,  that  will  be  pleasant,  with  competitive  exami- 
nation going  on  over  one's  plate ;  the  competition  being 
among  the  examiners.  Keally,  now  that  I  know  what  teasing 
things  girls  are,  I  don't  so  much  wonder  that  people  used  to 
put  up  patiently  with  the  dragons  who  took  them  for  supper. 
But  I  can't  help  myself,  I  suppose  ; — no  thanks  to  St.  George. 
Ask  away,  children,  and  I'll  answer  as  civilly  as  may  be. 

Dora.  We  don't  so  much  care  about  being  answered  civilly, 
as  about  not  being  asked  things  back  again. 

L.  cAyez  seulement  la  patience  que  je  le  parle.'  There 
shall  be  no  requitals. 

Dora.  Well,  then,  first  of  all — What  shall  we  ask  first, 
Mary  ? 

Mary.  It  does  not  matter.  I  think  all  the  questions  come 
into  one,  at  last,  nearly. 

Dora.  You  know,  you  always  talk  as  if  the  crystals  were 
alive  ;  and  we  never  understand  how  much  you  are  in  play, 
and  how  much  in  earnest.    That's  the  first  thing. 

L.  Neither  do  I  understand,  myself,  my  dear,  how  much  I 
am  in  earnest.  The  stones  puzzle  me  as  much  as  I  puzzle 
you.  They  look  as  if  they  were  alive,  and  make  me  speak  as 
if  they  were  ;  and  I  do  not  in  the  least  know  how  much  truth 


THE  ETHICS  OF  THE  DUST. 


there  is  in  the  appearance.  I'm  not  to  ask  things  back  again 
to-night,  but  all  questions  of  this  sort  lead  necessarily  to  the 
one  main  question,  which  we  asked,  before,  in  vain,  '  What  is 
it  to  be  alive  ? ' 

Dora.  Yes  ;  but  we  want  to  come  back  to  that :  for  we've 
been  reading  scientific  books  about  the  '  conservation  of 
forces,'  and  it  seems  all  so  grand,  and  wonderful ;  and  the 
experiments  are  so  pretty  ;  and  I  suppose  it  must  be  all 
right :  but  then  the  books  never  speak  as  if  there  were  any 
such  thing  as  '  life.' 

L.  They  mostly  omit  that  part  of  the  subject,  certainly, 
Dora  ;  but  they  are  beautifully  right  as  far  as  they  go  ;  and 
life  is  not  a  convenient  element  to  deal  with.  They  seem  to 
have  been  getting  some  of  it  into  and  out  of  bottles,  in  their 
'  ozone  '  and  '  antizone '  lately  ;  but  they  still  know  little  of 
it :  and,  certainly,  I  know  less. 

Dora.  You  promised  not  to  be  provoking,  to-night. 

L.  Wait  a  minute.  Though,  quite  truly,  I  know  less  of  the 
secrets  of  life  than  the  philosophers  do  ;  I  yet  know  one  cor- 
ner of  ground  on  which  we  artists  can  stand,  literally  as 
'Life  Guards'  at  bay,  as  steadily  as  the  Guards  at  Inker- 
rnann  ;  however  hard  the  philosophers  push.  And  you  may 
stand  with  us,  if  once  you  learn  to  draw  nicely. 

Dora.  I'm  sure  we  are  all  trying  !  but  tell  us  where  we  may 
stand. 

L.  You  may  always  stand  by  Form,  against  Force.  To  a 
painter,  the  essential  character  of  anything  is  the  form  of  it ; 
and  the  philosophers  cannot  touch  that.  They  come  and  tell 
you,  for  instance,  that  there  is  as  much  heat,  or  motion,  or 
calorific  energy  (or  whatever  else  they  like  to  call  it),  in  a  tea- 
kettle as  in  a  Gier-eagle.  Very  good  ;  that  is  so  ;  and  it  is 
very  interesting.  It  requires  just  as  much  heat  as  will  boil 
the  kettle,  to  take  the  Gier-eagle  up  to  his  nest  ;  and  as  much 
more  to  bring  him  down  again  on  a  hare  or  a  partridge. 
But  we  painters,  acknowledging  the  equality  and  similarity 
of  the  kettle  and  the  bird  in  all  scientific  respects,  attach, 
for  our  part,  our  principal  interest  to  the  difference  in  their 
forms.    For  us,  the  primarily  cognisable  facts,  in  the  two 


THE  CRYSTAL  REST. 


127 


things,  are,  that  the  kettle  has  a  spout,  and  the  eagle  a  beak  ; 
the  one  a  lid  on  its  back,  the  other  a  pair  of  wings  ; — not  to 
speak  of  the  distinction  also  of  volition,  which  the  philoso- 
phers may  properly  call  merely  a  form  or  mode  of  force  ; — 
but  then,  to  an  artist,  the  form,  or  mode,  is  the  gist  of  the 
business.  The  kettle  chooses  to  sit  still  on  the  hob  ;  the 
eagle  to  recline  on  the  air.  It  is  the  fact  of  the  choice,  not 
the  equal  degree  of  temperature  in  the  fulfilment  of  it,  which 
appears  to  us  the  more  interesting  circumstance  ; — though 
the  other  is  very  interesting  too.  Exceedingly  so  !  Don't 
laugh,  children  ;  the  philosophers  have  been  doing  quite 
splendid  work  lately,  in  their  own  way :  especially,  the  trans- 
formation of  force  into  light  is  a  great  piece  of  systematised 
discovery ;  and  this  notion  about  the  sun's  being  supplied 
with  his  flame  by  ceaseless  meteoric  hail  is  grand,  and  looks 
very  likely  to  be  true.  Of  course,  it  is  only  the  old  gun- 
lock, — flint  and  steel, — on  a  large  scale  :  but  the  order  and 
majesty  of  it  are  sublime.  Still,  we  sculptors  and  painters 
care  little  about  it.  'It  is  very  fine,'  we  say,  'and  very  useful, 
this  knocking  the  light  out  of  the  sun,  or  into  it,  by  an  eter- 
nal cataract  of  planets.  But  you  may  hail  away,  so,  for  ever, 
and  you  will  not  knock  out  what  we  can.  Here  is  a  bit  of 
silver,  not  the  size  of  half-a-erown,  on  which,  wTith  a  single 
hammer  stroke,  one  of  us,  two  thousand  and  odd  years  ago, 
hit  out  the  head  of  the  Apollo  of  Clazomenae.  It  is  merely  a 
matter  of  form  ;  but  if  any  of  you  philosophers,  with  your 
whole  planetary  system  to  hammer  with,  can  hit  out  such 
another  bit  of  silver  as  this, — we  w7ill  take  off  our  hats  to  you. 
For  the  present,  we  keep  them  on.' 

Mary.  Yes,  I  understand  ;  and  that  is  nice  ;  but  I  don't 
think  we  shall  any  of  us  like  having  only  form  to  depend  upon. 

L.  It  was  not  neglected  in  the  making  of  Eve,  my  dear. 

Mary.  It  does  not  seem  to  separate  us  from  the  dust  of  the 
ground.  It  is  that  breathing  of  the  life  which  we  want  to 
understand. 

L.  So  you  should  :  but  hold  fast  to  the  form,  and  defend 
that  first,  as  distinguished  from  the  mere  transition  of  forces. 
Discern  the  moulding  hand  of  the  potter  commanding  the 


128 


THE  ETHICS  OF  THE  DUST. 


clay,  from  his  merely  beating  foot,  as  it  turns  the  wheel.  II 
you  can  find  incense,  in  the  vase,  afterwards, — well :  but  it  is 
curious  how  far  mere  form  will  carry  you  ahead  of  the  phil- 
osophers. For  instance,  with  regard  to  the  most  interesting 
of  all  their  modes  of  force — light ; — they  never  consider  how 
far  the  existence  of  it  depends  on  the  putting  of  certain 
vitreous  and  nervous  substances  into  the  formal  arrangement 
which  we  call  an  eye.  The  German  philosophers  began  the 
attack,  long  ago,  on  the  other  side,  by  telling  us,  there  was 
no  such  thing  as  light  at  all,  unless  wre  chose  to  see  it :  now, 
German  and  English,  both,  have  reversed  their  engines,  and 
insist  that  light  would  be  exactly  the  same  light  that  it  is, 
though  nobody  could  ever  see  it.  The  fact  being  that  the 
force  must  be  there,  and  the  eyes  there  ;  and  c  light '  means 
the  effect  of  the  one  on  the  other  ; — and  perhaps,  also — (Plato 
saw  farther  into  that  mystery  than  any  one  has  since,  that  I 
know  of), — on  something  a  little  way  within  the  eyes  ;  but  we 
may  stand  quite  safe,  close  behind  the  retina,  and  defy  the 
philosophers. 

Sibyl.  But  I  don't  care  so  much  about  defying  the  philoso- 
phers, if  only  one  could  get  a  clear  idea  of  life,  or  soul,  for 
one's  self. 

L  Well,  Sibyl,  you  used  to  know  more  about  it,  in  that 
cave  of  yours,  than  any  of  us.  I  was  just  going  to  ask  you 
about  inspiration,  and  the  golden  bough,  and  the  like  ;  only  I 
remembered  I  was  not  to  ask  anything.  But,  will  not  you, 
at  least,  tell  us  whether  the  ideas  of  Life,  as  the  power  of 
putting  things  together,  or  6  making '  them  ;  and  of  Death,  as 
the  power  of  pushing  things  separate,  or  c  unmaking '  them, 
may  not  be  very  simply  held  in  balance  against  each  other? 

Sibyl.  No,  I  am  not  in  my  cave  to-night ;  and  cannot  tell 
you  anything. 

L.  I  think  they  may.  Modern  Philosophy  is  a  great  sepa- 
rator ;  it  is  little  more  than  the  expansion  of  Moliere's  great 
sentence,  ' II  s'ensuit  de  la,  que  tout  ce  qu'il  y  a  de  beau  est 
dans  les  dictionnaires  ;  il  n'y  a  que  les  mots  qui  sont  trans- 
poses.' But  when  you  used  to  be  in  your  cave,  Sibyl,  and  to 
be  inspired,  there  was  (and  there  remains  still  in  some  small 


THE  CRYSTAL  REST. 


129 


measure),  beyond  the  merely  formative  and  sustaining  power, 
another,  which  we  painters  call  '  passion  ' — I  don't  know  what 
the  philosophers  call  it ;  we  know  it  makes  people  red,  or 
white  ;  and  therefore  it  must  be  something,  itself  ;  and  per- 
haps it  is  the  most  truly  '  poetic  '  or  '  making  '  force  of  all, 
creating  a  world  of  its  own  out  of  a  glance,  or  a  sigh  :  and 
the  want  of  passion  is  perhaps  the  truest  death,  or  6  unmaking  9 
of  everything  ; — even  of  stones.  By  the  way,  you  were  all 
reading  about  that  ascent  of  the  Aiguille  Verte,  the  other 
day? 

Sibyl.  Because  you  had  told  us  it  was  so  difficult,  you 
thought  it  could  not  be  ascended. 

L.  Yes  ;  I  believed  the  Aiguille  Verte  would  have  held  its 
own.  But  do  you  recollect  wThat  one  of  the  climbers  ex- 
claimed, when  he  first  felt  sure  of  reaching  the  summit  ? 

Sibyl.  Yes,  it  was,  £  Oh,  Aiguille  Verte,  vous  etes  morte, 
vous  etes  morte  ! ' 

L.  That  was  true  instinct.  Real  philosophic  joy.  Now 
can  you  at  all  fancy  the  difference  between  that  feeling  of 
triumph  in  a  mountain's  death ;  and  the  exultation  of  your 
beloved  poet,  in  its  life — 

4  Quan tus  Athos,  aut  quantus  Eryx,  ant  ipse  coruscis 
Quum  fremit  ilicibus  quantus,  gaudetque  nivali 
Vertice,  se  attollens  pater  Apeiminus  ad  auras.' 

Dora.  You  must  translate  for  us  mere  house-keepers,  please, 
f— whatever  the  cave-keepers  may  know  about  it. 
Mary.  Will  Dryden  do  ? 

L.  No.  Dryden  is  a  far  way  worse  than  nothing,  and  nobody 
will  c  do.'  You  can't  translate  it.  But  this  is  all  you  need 
know,  that  the  lines  are  full  of  a  passionate  sense  of  the  Apen- 
nines' fatherhood,  or  protecting  power  over  Italy  ;  and  of  sym- 
pathy with  their  joy  in  their  snowy  strength  in  heaven  ;  and 
with  the  same  joy,  shuddering  through  all  the  leaves  of  their 
forests. 

Mary.  Yes,  that  is  a  difference  indeed  !  but  then,  you  know, 
one  can't  help  feeling  that  it  is  fanciful.  It  is  very  delightful 
to  imagine  the  mountains  to  be  alive ;  but  then, — are  they  alive? 


130 


THE  ETHICS  OF  THE  DUST. 


L.  It  seems  to  me,  on  the  whole,  Mary,  that  the  feelmga 
of  the  purest  and  most  mightily  passioned  human  souls  are 
likely  to  be  the  truest.  Not,  indeed,  if  they  do  not  desire  to 
know  the  truth,  or  blind  themselves  to  it  that  they  may  please 
themselves  with  passion  ;  for  then  they  are  no  longer  pure  : 
but  if,  continually  seeking  and  accepting  the  truth  as  far  as  it 
is  discernible,  they  trust  their  Maker  for  the  integrity  of  the 
instincts  He  has  gifted  them  with,  and  rest  in  the  sense  of  a 
higher  truth  which  they  cannot  demonstrate,  I  think  they 
will  be  most  in  the  right,  so. 

Dora  and  Jessie  {clapping  their  hands).  Then  we  really 
may  believe  that  the  mountains  are  living? 

Ix  You  may  at  least  earnestly  believe,  that  the  presence  of 
the  spirit  which  culminates  in  your  own  life,  shows  itself  in 
dawning,  wherever  the  dust  of  the  earth  begins  to  assume 
any  orderly  and  lovely  state.  You  will  find  it  impossible  to 
separate  this  idea  of  gradated  manifestation  from  that  of  the 
vital  power.  Things  are  not  either  wholly  alive,  or  wholly 
dead.  They  are  less  or  more  alive.  Take  the  nearest,  most 
easily  examined  instance — the  life  of  a  flower.  Notice  what  a 
different  degree  and  kind  of  life  there  is  in  the  calyx  and  the 
corolla.  The  calyx  is  nothing  but  the  swaddling  clothes  of 
the  flower  ;  the  child-blossom  is  bound  up  in  it,  hand  and 
foot ;  guarded  in  it,  restrained  by  it,  till  the  time  of  birth. 
The  shell  is  hardly  more  subordinate  to  the  germ  in  the  egg, 
lhan  the  calyx  to  the  blossom.  It  bursts  at  last ;  but  it  never 
lives  as  the  corolla  does.  It  may  fall  at  the  moment  its  task 
is  fulfilled,  as  in  the  poppy ;  or  wither  gradually,  as  in  the 
buttercup  ;  or  persist  in  a  ligneous  apathy,  after  the  flower  is 
dead,  as  in  the  rose  ;  or  harmonise  itself  so  as  to  share  in  the 
aspect  of  the  real  flower,  as  in  the  lily  ;  but  it  never  shares  in 
the  corolla's  bright  passion  of  life.  And  the  gradations  which 
thus  exist  between  the  different  members  of  organic  creat- 
ures, exist  no  less  between  the  different  ranges  of  organism. 
We  know  no  higher  or  more  energetic  life  than  our  own  ;  but 
there  seems  to  me  this  great  good  in  the  idea  of  gradation  of 
life — it  admits  the  idea  of  a  life  above  us,  in  other  creatures,  as 
much  nobler  than  ours,  as  ours  is  nobler  than  that  of  the  dust. 


THE  CRYSTAL  REST. 


131 


Mary.  I  am  glad  you  have  said  that ;  for  I  know  Violet  and 
Lucilla  and  May  want  to  ask  you  something  ;  indeed,  we  all 
do  ;  only  you  frightened  Violet  so  about  the  ant-hill,  that  she 
can't  say  a  word  ;  and  May  is  afraid  of  your  teasing  her,  too  % 
but  I  know  they  are  wondering  why  you  are  always  telling 
them  about  heathen  gods  and  goddesses,  as  if  you  half  be- 
lieved in  them  ;  and  you  represent  them  as  good  ;  and  then 
we  see  there  is  really  a  kind  of  truth  in  the  stories  about 
them  ;  and  we  are  all  puzzled  :  and,  in  tins,  we  cannot  even 
make  our  difficulty  quite  clear  to  ourselves  ; — it  would  be 
such  a  long  confused  question,  if  we  could  ask  you  all  we 
should  like  to  know. 

L.  Nor  is  it  any  wonder,  Mary  ;  for  this  is  indeed  the  long- 
est, and  the  most  wildly  confused  question  that  reason  can 
deal  with  ;  but  I  will  try  to  give  you,  quickly,  a  few  clear 
ideas  about  the  heathen  gods,  which  you  may  follow  out 
afterwards,  as  your  knowledge  increases. 

Every  heathen  conception  of  deity  in  which  you  are  likely 
to  be  interested,  has  three  distinct  characters  : — 

I.  It  has  a  physical  character.  It  represents  some  of  the 
great  powers  or  objects  of  nature — sun  or  moon,  or  heaven, 
or  the  winds,  or  the  sea.  And  the  fables  first  related  about 
each  deity  represent,  figuratively,  the  action  of  the  natural 
power  which  it  represents  ;  such  as  the  rising  and  setting  of 
the  sun,  the  tides  of  the  sea,  and  so  on. 

II.  It  has  an  ethical  character,  and  represents,  in  its  his- 
tory, the  moral  dealings  of  God  with  man.  Thus  Apollo  is 
first,  physically,  the  sun  contending  wTith  darkness  ;  but  mor- 
ally, the  power  of  divine  life  contending  with  corruption. 
Athena  is,  physically,  the  air  ;  morally,  the  breathing  of  the 
divine  spirit  of  wisdom.  Neptune  is,  physically,  the  sea ; 
morally,  the  supreme  power  of  agitating  passion  ;  and  so  on. 

III.  It  has,  at  last,  a  personal  character  ;  and  is  realised  in 
the  minds  of  its  worshippers  as  a  living  spirit,  with  whom 
men  may  speak  face  to  face,  as  a  man  speaks  to  his  friend. 

Now  it  is  impossible  to  define  exactly,  how  far,  at  any 
period  of  a  national  religion,  these  three  ideas  are  mingled  ; 
or  how  far  one  prevails  over  the  other.     Eacli  enquirer 


132 


TEE  ETHICS  OF  THE  DUST. 


usually  takes  up  one  of  these  ideas,  and  pursues  it,  to  the 
exclusion  of  the  others  :  no  impartial  effort  seems  to  have 
been  made  to  discern  the  real  state  of  the  heathen  imagina- 
tion in  its  successive  phases.  For  the  question  is  not  at  all 
what  a  mythological  figure  meant  in  its  origin  ;  but  what  it 
became  in  each  subsequent  mental  development  of  the  nation 
inheriting  the  thought.  Exactly  in  proportion  to  the  mental 
and  moral  insight  of  any  race,  its  mythological  figures  mean 
more  to  it,  and  become  more  real.  An  early  and  savage  race 
means  nothing  more  (because  it  has  nothing  more  to  mean) 
by  its  Apollo,  than  the  sun  ;  while  a  cultivated  Greek  means 
every  operation  of  divine  intellect  and  justice.  The  Neith,  of 
Egypt,  meant,  physically,  little  more  than  the  blue  of  the  air ; 
but  the  Greek,  in  a  climate  of  alternate  storm  and  calm,  rep- 
resented the  wild  fringes  of  the  storm-cloud  by  the  serpents 
of  her  aegis  ;  and  the  lightning  and  cold  of  the  highest 
thunder-clouds,  by  the  Gorgon  on  her  shield  :  while  morally, 
the  same  types  represented  to  him  the  mystery  and  changeful 
terror  of  knowledge,  as  her  spear  and  helm  its  ruling  and  de- 
fensive power.  And  no  study  can  be  more  interesting,  or 
more  useful  to  you,  than  that  of  the  different  meanings  which 
have  been  created  by  great  nations,  and  great  poets,  out  of 
mythological  figures  given  them,  at  first,  in  utter  simplicity. 
But  when  we  approach  them  in  their  third,  or  personal,  char- 
acter (and,  for  its  power  over  the  whole  national  mind,  this  is 
far  the  leading  one),  we  are  met  at  once  by  questions  which 
may  well  put  all  of  you  at  pause.  Were  they  idly  imagined 
to  be  real  beings  ?  and  did  they  so  usurp  the  place  of  the 
true  God  ?  Or  were  they  actually  real  beings — evil  spirits, — 
leading  men  away  from  the  true  God  ?  Or  is  it  conceivable 
that  they  might  have  been  real  beings, — good  spirits, — en- 
trusted with  some  message  from  the  true  God  ?  These  were 
the  questions  you  wanted  to  ask  ;  were  they  not,  Lucilla  ? 
Lucilla.  Yes,  indeed. 

L.  Well,  Lucilla,  the  answer  will  much  depend  upon  the 
clearness  of  your  faith  in  the  personality  of  the  spirits  which 
are  described  in  the  book  of  your  own  religion  ; — their  per- 
sonality, observe,  as  distinguished  from  merely  symbolical  vis- 


THE  CRYSTAL  REST. 


133 


ions.  For  instance,  when  Jeremiah  has  the  vision  of  the 
seething  pot  with  its  mouth  to  the  north,  you  know  that  this 
which  he  sees  is  not  a  real  thing ;  but  merely  a  significant 
dream.  Also,  when  Zechariah  sees  the  speckled  horses  among 
the  myrtle  trees  in  the  bottom,  you  still  may  suppose  the 
vision  symbolical ; — you  do  not  think  of  them  as  real  spirits, 
like  Pegasus,  seen  in  the  form  of  horses.  But  when  you  are 
told  of  the  four  riders  in  the  Apocalypse,  a  distinct  sense  of 
personality  begins  to  force  itself  upon  you.  And  though  you 
might,  in  a  dull  temper,  think  that  (for  one  instance  of  all)  the 
fourth  rider  on  the  pale  horse  was  merely  a  symbol  of  the 
power  of  death, — in  your  stronger  and  more  earnest  moods 
you  will  rather  conceive  of  him  as  a  real  and  living  angel. 
And  when  you  look  back  from  the  vision  of  the  Apocalypse 
to  the  account  of  the  destruction  of  the  Egyptian  first-born, 
and  of  the  army  of  Sennacherib,  and  again  to  David's  vision 
at  the  threshing  floor  of  Araunah,  the  idea  of  personality  in 
this  death-angel  becomes  entirely  defined,  just  as  in  the  ap- 
pearance of  the  angels  to  Abraham,  Manoah,  or  Mary. 

Now,  when  you  have  once  consented  to  this  idea  of  a  per- 
sonal spirit,  must  not  the  question  instantly  follow :  ■  Does 
this  spirit  exercise  its  functions  towards  one  race  of  men  only, 
or  towards  all  men  ?  Was  it  an  angel  of  death  to  the  Jew 
only,  or  to  the  Gentile  also  ? '  You  find  a  certain  Divine 
agency  made  visible  to  a  King  of  Israel,  as  an  armed  angel, 
executing  vengeance,  of  which  one  special  purpose  was  to 
lower  his  kingly  pride.  You  find  another  (or  perhaps  the 
same)  agency,  made  visible  to  a  Christian  prophet  as  an  angel 
standing  in  the  sun,  calling  to  the  birds  that  fly  under  heaven 
to  come,  that  they  may  eat  the  flesh  of  kings.  Is  there  any- 
thing impious  in  the  thought  that  the  same  agency  might 
have  been  expressed  to  a  Greek  king,  or  Greek  seer,  by  simi- 
lar visions  ? — that  this  figure,  standing  in  the  sun,  and  armed 
with  the  sword,  or  the  bow  (whose  arrows  were  drunk  with 
blood),  and  exercising  especially  its  power  in  the  humiliation 
of  the  proud,  might,  at  first,  have  been  called  only  'De- 
stroyer/ and  afterwards,  as  the  light,  or  sun,  of  justice,  was 
recognised  in  the  chastisement,  called  also  '  Physician '  or 


134 


THE  ETHICS  OF  THE  DUST. 


'  Healer  ?  '  If  you  feel  hesitation  in  admitting  the  possibility 
of  such  a  manifestation,  I  believe  you  will  find  it  is  caused, 
partly  indeed  by  such  trivial  things  as  the  difference  to  your 
ear  between  Greek  and  English  terms  ;  but,  far  more,  by  un- 
certainty in  your  own  mind  respecting  the  nature  and  truth< 
of  the  visions  spoken  of  in  the  Bible.  Have  any  of  you  in- 
tently examined  the  nature  of  your  belief  in  them  ?  You, 
for  instance,  Lucilla,  who  think  often,  and  seriously,  of  such 
things  ? 

Lucilla.  No  ;  I  never  could  tell  what  to  believe  about  them,  i 
I  know  they  must  be  true  in  some  way  or  other ;  and  I  like 
reading  about  them. 

L.  Yes ;  and  I  like  reading  about  them  too,  Lucilla ;  as  I 
like  reading  other  grand  poetry.  But,  surely,  we  ought  both 
to  do  more  than  like  it  ?  Will  God  be  satisfied  with  us,  think 
you,  if  we  read  His  words  merely  for  the  sake  of  an  entirely 
meaningless  poetical  sensation  ? 

Lucilla.  But  do  not  the  people  who  give  themselves  to  seek 
out  the  meaning  of  these  things,  often  get  very  strange,  and 
extravagant  ? 

L.  More  than  that,  Lucilla.  They  often  go  mad.  That 
abandonment  of  the  mind  to  religious  theory,  or  contempla- 
tion, is  the  very  thing  I  have  been  pleading  with  you  against. 
I  never  said  you  should  set  yourself  to  discover  the  mean- 
ings ;  but  you  should  take  careful  pains  to  understand  them, 
so  far  as  they  are  clear ;  and  you  should  always  accurately 
ascertain  the  state  of  your  mind  about  them.  I  want  you 
never  to  read  merely  for  the  pleasure  of  fancy  ;  still  less  as  a 
formal  religious  duty  (else  you  might  as  wrell  take  to  repeat- 
ing Paters  at  once  ;  for  it  is  surely  wiser  to  repeat  one  thing 
we  understand,  than  read  a  thousand  which  we  cannot). 
Either,  therefore,  acknowledge  the  passages  to  be,  for  the 
present,  unintelligible  to  you  ;  or  else  determine  the  sense  in 
which  you  at  present  receive  them  ;  or,  at  all  events,  the  dif- 
ferent senses  between  which  you  clearly  see  that  you  must 
choose.  Make  either  your  belief,  or  your  difficulty,  definite  ; 
but  do  not  go  on,  all  through  your  life,  believing  nothing  in- 
telligently, and  yet  supposing  that  your  having  read  the  worda 


THE  CRYSTAL  REST. 


135 


of  a  divine  book  must  give  you  the  right  to  despise  every  reli- 
gion but  your  own.  I  assure  you,  strange  as  it  may  seem,  our 
scorn  of  Greek  tradition  depends,  not  on  our  belief,  but  our 
disbelief,  of  our  own  traditions.  We  have,  as  yet,  no  sufficient 
clue  to  the  meaning  of  either  ;  but  you  will  always  find  that, 
in  proportion  to  the  earnestness  of  our  own  faith,  its  tendency 
to  accept  a  spiritual  personality  increases  :  and  that  the  most 
vital  and  beautiful  Christian  temper  rests  joyfully  in  its  con- 
viction of  the  multitudinous  ministry  of  living  angels,  infinitely, 
varied  in  rank  and  power.  You  all  know  one  expression  of 
the  purest  and  happiest  form  of  such  faith,  as  it  exists  in 
modern  times,  in  Richter's  lovely  illustrations  of  the  Lord's 
Prayer.  The  real  and  living  death-angel,  girt  as  a  pilgrim  for 
journey,  and  softly  crowned  with  flowers,  beckons  at  the  dying 
mother's  door  ;  child-angels  sit  talking  face  to  face  with  mor- 
tal children,  among  the  flowers  ; — hold  them  by  their  little 
coats,  lest  they  fall  on  the  stairs  ; — whisper  dreams  of  heaven 
to  them,  leaning  over  their  pillows  ;  carry  the  sound  of  the 
church  bells  for  them  far  through  the  air  ;  and  even  descend- 
ing lower  in  service,  fill  little  cups  with  honey,  to  hold  out  to  the 
weary  bee.  By  the  way,  Lily,  did  you  tell  the  other  children 
that  story  about  your  little  sister,  and  Alice,  and  the  sea  ? 

Lily.  I  told  it  to  Alice,  and  to  Miss  Dora.  I  don't  think  I 
did  to  anybody  else.    I  thought  it  wasn't  worth. 

L.  We  shall  think  it  worth  a  great  deal  now,  Lily,  if  you 
will  tell  it  us.    How  old  is  Dotty,  again  ?    I  forget, 

Lily.  She  is  not  quite  three  ;  but  she  has  such  odd  little 
old  ways,  sometimes. 

L.  And  she  was  very  fond  of  Alice  ? 

Lily.  Yes  ;  Alice  was  so  good  to  her  always ! 

L,  And  so  when  Alice  went  away  ? 

Lily.  Oh,  it  was  nothing,  you  know,  to  tell  about ;  only  it 
was  strange  at  the  time. 

L.  Well ;  but  I  want  you  to  tell  it, 

Lily.  The  morning  after  Alice  had  gone,  Dotty  was  very  sad 
and  restless  when  she  got  up  ;  and  went  about,  looking  into 
all  the  corners,  as  if  she  could  find  Alice  in  them,  and  at  last 
she  came  to  me,  and  said,  ' Is  Alie  gone  over  the  great  sea?' 


136 


THE  ETHICS  OF  THE  DUST. 


And  I  said,  '  Yes,  she  is  gone  over  the  great,  deep  sea,  but  she 
will  come  back  again  some  day.'  Then  Dotty  looked  round 
the  room  ;  and  I  had  just  poured  some  water  out  into  the 
basin  ;  and  Dotty  ran  to  it,  and  got  up  on  a  chair,  and  dashed 
her  hands  through  the  water,  again  and  again  ;  and  cried, 
6  Oh,  deep,  deep  sea  !  send  little  Alie  back  to  me.' 

L.  Isn't  that  pretty,  children  ?  There's  a  dear  little  heathen 
for  you  !  The  whole  heart  of  Greek  mythology  is  in  that ;  the 
idea  of  a  personal  being  in  the  elemental  power  ; — of  its  being 
moved  by  prayer ; — and  of  its  presence  everywhere,  making 
the  broken  diffusion  of  the  element  sacred. 

Now,  remember,  the  measure  in  which  we  may  permit  our- 
selves to  think  of  this  trusted  and  adored  personality,  in 
Greek,  or  in  any  other,  mythology,  as  conceivably  a  shadow 
of  truth,  will  depend  on  the  degree  in  wThich  we  hold  the 
Greeks,  or  other  great  nations,  equal,  or  inferior,  in  privilege 
and  character,  to  the  Jews,  or  to  ourselves.  If  we  believe  that 
the  great  Father  would  use  the  imagination  of  the  Jew  as  an 
instrument  by  which  to  exalt  and  lead  him  ;  but  the  imagina- 
tion of  the  Greek  only  to  degrade  and  mislead  him  :  if  we  can 
suppose  that  real  angels  were  sent  to  minister  to  the  Jews 
and  to  punish  them  ;  but  no  angels,  or  only  mocking  spectra 
of  angels,  or  even  devils  in  the  shapes  of  angels,  to  lead  Lycur- 
gus  and  Leonidas  from  desolate  cradle  to  hopeless  grave  : — 
and  if  we  can  think  that  it  was  only  the  influence  of  spectres, 
or  the  teaching  of  demons,  which  issued  in  the  making  of 
mothers  like  Cornelia,  and  of  sons  like  Cleobis  and  Bito,  we 
may,  of  course,  reject  the  heathen  Mythology  in  our  privileged 
scorn  :  but,  at  least,  we  are  bound  to  examine  strictly  by  what 
faults  of  our  own  it  has  come  to  pass,  that  the  ministry  of  real 
angels  among  ourselves  is  occasionally  so  ineffectual,  as  to  end 
in  the  production  of  Cornelias  who  entrust  their  child-jewels 
to  Charlotte  "Winsors  for  the  better  keeping  of  them  ;  and  of 
sons  like  that  one  who,  the  other  day,  in  France,  beat  his 
mother  to  death  with  a  stick  ;  and  was  brought  in  by  the  jury, 
<  guilty,  with  extenuating  circumstances.' 

May.  Was  that  really  possible  ? 

L.  Yes,  my  dear.    I  am  not  sure  that  I  can  lay  my  hand 


THE  CRYSTAL  REST. 


137 


on  the  reference  to  it  (and  I  should  not  have  said  '  the  other 
day ' — it  was  a  year  or  two  ago),  but  you  may  depend  on  the 
fact ;  and  I  could  give  you  many  like  it,  if  I  chose.  There 
was  a  murder  done  in  Bussia,  very  lately,  on  a  traveller. 
The  murderess's  little  daughter  was  in  the  way,  and  found  it 
out,  somehow.  Her  mother  killed  her,  too,  and  put  her  into 
the  oven.  There  is  a  peculiar  horror  about  the  relations  be- 
tween parent  and  child,  which  are  being  now  brought  about 
by  our  variously  degraded  forms  of  European  white  slavery. 
Here  is  one  reference,  I  see,  in  my  notes  on  that  story  of 
Cleobis  and  Bito  ;  though  I  suppose  I  marked  this  chiefly 
for  its  quaintness,  and  the  beautifully  Christian  names  of  the 
sons ;  but  it  is  a  good  instance  of  the  power  of  the  King  of 
the  Valley  of  Diamonds  *  among  us. 

In  '  Galignani '  of  July  21-22,  1862,  is  reported  a  trial  of  a 
farmer's  son  in  the  department  of  the  Yonne.  The  father, 
two  years  ago,  at  Malay  le  Grand,  gave  up  his  property  to 
his  two  sons,  on  condition  of  being  maintained  by  them. 
Simon  fulfilled  his  agreement,  but  Pierre  would  not.  The 
tribunal  of  Sens  condemns  Pierre  to  pay  eighty-four  francs  a 
year  to  his  father.  Pierre  replies,  £  he  would  rather  die  than 
pay  it.'  Actually,  returning  home,  he  throws  himself  into  the 
river,  and  the  body  is  not  found  till  next  day. 

Mary.  But — but — I  can't  tell  what  you  w^ould  have  us 
think.  Do  you  seriously  mean  that  the  Greeks  were  better 
than  we  are  ;  and  that  their  gods  were  real  angels  ? 

L.  No,  my  dear.  I  mean  only  that  we  know,  in  reality, 
less  than  nothing  of  the  dealings  of  our  Maker  with  our 
fellow-men  ;  and  can  only  reason  or  conjecture  safely  about 
them,  when  we  have  sincerely  humble  thoughts  of  ourselves 
and  our  creeds. 

"We  owe  to  the  Greeks  every  noble  discipline  in  literature  ; 
every  radical  principle  of  art ;  and  every  form  of  convenient 
beauty  in  our  household  furniture  and  daily  occupations  of 
life.  We  are  unable,  ourselves,  to  make  rational  use  of  half 
that  we  have  received  from  them  :  and,  of  our  own,  we  have 
nothing  but  discoveries  in  science,  and  fine  mechanical  adap- 

*  Note  vi. 


138 


THE  ETHICS  OF  THE  DUST. 


tations  of  the  discovered  physical  powers.  On  the  other 
hand,  the  vice  existing  among  certain  classes,  both  of  the  rich 
and  poor,  in  London,  Paris,  and  Vienna,  could  have  been 
conceived  by  a' Spartan  or  Roman  of  the  heroic  ages  only  as 
possible  in  a  Tartarus,  where  fiends  were  employed  to  teach, 
but  not  to  punish,  crime.  It  little  becomes  us  to  speak  con- 
temptuously of  the  religion  of  races  to  whom  we  stand  in 
such  relations ;  nor  do  I  think  any  man  of  modesty  or 
thoughtfulness  will  ever  speak  so  of  any  religion,  in  which 
God  has  allowed  one  good  man  to  die,  trusting. 

The  more  readily  we  admit  the  possibility  of  our  own  cher- 
ished convictions  being  mixed  with  error,  the  more  vital 
and  helpful  wrhatever  is  right  in  them  will  become  :  and  no 
error  is  so  conclusively  fatal  as  the  idea  that  God  will  not 
allow  us  to  err,  though  He  has  allowed  all  other  men  to  do 
so.  There  may  be  doubt  of  the  meaning  of  other  visions, 
but  there  is  none  respecting  that  of  the  dream  of  St.  Peter  ; 
and  you  may  trust  the  Eock  of  the  Church's  Foundation  for 
true  interpreting,  when  he  learned  from  it  that,  'in  every 
nation,  he  that  feareth  God  and  worketh  righteousness,  is 
accepted  with  Him/  See  that  you  understand  what  that 
righteousness  means  ;  and  set  hand  to  it  stoutly :  you  will 
always  measure  your  neighbors'  creed  kindly;  in  proportion 
to  the  substantial  fruits  of  your  own.  Do  not  think  you  will 
ever  get  harm  by  striving  to  enter  into  the  faith  of  others, 
and  to  sympathise,  in  imagination,  with  the  guiding  prin- 
ciples of  their  lives.  So  only  can  you  justly  love  them,  or 
pity  them,  or  praise.  By  the  gracious  effort  you  will  double, 
treble — nay,  indefinitely  multiply,  at  once  the  pleasure,  the 
reverence,  and  the  intelligence  with  which  you  read  :  and, 
believe  me,  it  is  wiser  and  holier,  by  the  fire  of  your  own 
faith  to  kindle  the  ashes  of  expired  religions,  than  to  let  your 
soul  shiver  and  stumble  among  their  graves,  through  the 
gathering  darkness,  and  communicable  cold. 

Mary  (after  some  pause).  We  shall  all  like  reading  Greek 
history  so  much  better  after  this  !  but  it  has  put  everything 
else  out  of  our  heads  that  we  wanted  to  ask. 

L.  I  can  tell  you  one  of  the  things  ;  and  I  might  take 


THE  CRYSTAL  REST. 


139 


credit  for  generosity  in  telling  you  ;  but  I  have  a  personal 
reason — Lucilla's  verse  about  the  creation.  . 

Dora.  Oh,  yes — yes  ;  and  its  'pain  together,  until  now.' 

L.  I  call  you  back  to  that,  because  I  must  warn  you  against 
an  old  error  of  my  own.  Somewhere  in  the  fourth  volume 
of  '  Modern  Painters/  I  said  that  the  earth  seemed  to  have 
passed  through  its  highest  state  :  and  that,  after  ascending 
by  a  series  of  phases,  culminating  in  its  habitation  by  man, 
it  seems  to  be  now  gradually  becoming  less  fit  for  that 
habitation. 

Mary.  Yes,  I  remember. 

L.  I  wrote  those  passages  under  a  very  bitter  impression 
of  the  gradual  perishing  of  beauty  from  the  loveliest  scenes 
which  I  knew  in  the  physical  world ; — not  in  any  doubtful 
way,  such  as  I  might  have  attributed  to  loss  of  sensation  in 
myself — but  by  violent  and  definite  physical  action  ;  such  as 
the  filling  up  of  the  Lac  de  Chede  by  landslips  from  the  Ro- 
chers  des  Fiz ; — the  narrowing  of  the  Lake  Lucerne  by  the 
gaining  delta  of  the  stream  of  the  Muotta-Thal,  which,  in  the 
course  of  years,  will  cut  the  lake  into  two,  as  that  of  Brientz 
has  been  divided  from  that  of  Thun  ; — the  steady  diminishing 
of  the  glaciers  north  of  the  Alps,  and  still  more,  of  the  sheets 
of  snow  on  their  southern  slopes,  which  supply  the  refreshing 
streams  of  Lombardy  : — the  equally  steady  increase  of  deadly 
maremma  round  Pisa  and  Venice  ;  and  other  such  phenom- 
ena, quite  measurably  traceable  within  the  limits  even  of  short 
life,  and  unaccompanied,  as  it  seemed,  by  redeeming  or  com- 
pensatory agencies.  I  am  still  under  the  same  impression 
respecting  the  existing  phenomena  ;  but  I  feel  more  strongly, 
every  day,  that  no  evidence  to  be  collected  within  historical 
periods  can  be  accepted  as  any  clue  to  the  great  tendencies  of 
geological  change  ;  but  that  the  great  laws  which  never  fail, 
and  to  which  all  change  is  subordinate,  appear  such  as  to  ac- 
complish a  gradual  advance  to  lovelier  order,  and  more  calmly, 
yet  more  deeply,  animated  Rest.  Nor  has  this  conviction  ever 
fastened  itself  upon  me  more  distinctly,  than  during  my  en- 
deavour to  trace  the  laws  which  govern  the  lowly  framework 
of  the  dust.    For,  through  all  the  phases  of  its  transition  and 


140 


THE  ETHICS  OF  THE  DUST. 


dissolution,  there  seems  to  be  a  continual  effort  to  raise  itself 
into  a  higher  state  ;  and  a  measured  gain,  through  the  fierce 
revulsion  and  slow  renewal  of  the  earth's  frame,  in  beauty,  and 
order,  and  permanence.  The  soft  white  sediments  of  the  sea 
draw  themselves,  in  process  of  time,  into  smooth  knots  of 
sphered  symmetry  ;  burdened  and  strained  under  increase  of 
pressure,  they  pass  into  a  nascent  marble  ;  scorched  by  fervent 
heat,  they  brighten  and  blanch  into  the  snowy  rock  of  Faros  and 
Carrara.  The  dark  drift  of  the  inland  river,  or  stagnant  slime  of 
inland  pool  and  lake,  divides,  or  resolves  itself  as  it  dries,  into 
layers  of  its  several  elements ;  slowly  purifying  each  by  the 
patient  withdrawal  of  it  from  the  anarchy  of  the  mass  in 
which  it  was  mingled.  Contracted  by  increasing  drought, 
till  it  must  shatter  into  fragments,  it  infuses  continually  a 
finer  ichor  into  the  opening  veins,  and  finds  in  its  weakness 
the  first  rudiments  of  a  perfect  strength.  Rent  at  last,  rock 
from  rock,  nay,  atom  from  atom,  and  tormented  in  lambent 
fire,  it  knits,  through  the  fusion,  the  fibres  of  a  perennial 
endurance  ;  and,  during  countless  subsequent  centuries,  de- 
clining, or  rather  let  me  say,  rising  to  repose,  finishes  the  in- 
fallible lustre  of  its  crystalline  beauty,  under  harmonies  of 
law  which  are  wholly  beneficent,  because  wholly  inexorable. 

[The  children  seem  pleased,  but  more  inclined  to  think 
over  these  matters  than  to  talk.) 

L.  [after  giving  them  a  little  time).  Mary,  I  seldom  ask  you 
to  read  anything  out  of  books  of  mine  ;  but  there  is  a  passage 
about  the  Law  of  Help,  which  I  want  you  to  read  to  the 
children  now,  because  it  is  of  no  use  merely  to  put  it  in  other 
words  for  them.    You  know  the  place  I  mean,  do  not  you  ? 

Mary.  Yes  {presently  finding  it)  ;  where  shall  I  begin? 

L.  Here  ;  but  the  elder  ones  had  better  look  afterwards  at 
the  piece  which  comes  just  before  this. 

Mary  (reads)  : 

'  A  pure  or  holy  state  of  anything  is  that  in  which  all  its 
parts  are  helpful  or  consistent.  The  highest  and  first  law  of 
the  universe,  and  the  other  name  of  life,  m  therefore,  "help." 
The  other  name  of  death  is  "separation."    Government  and 


THE  CRYSTAL  REST. 


141 


co-operation  are  in  all  things,  and  eternally,  the  laws  of  life. 
Anarchy  and  competition,  eternally,  and  in  all  things,  the  laws 
of  death. 

'Perhaps  the  best,  though  the  most  familiar,  example  we 
could  take  of  the  nature  and  power  of  consistence,  will  be 
that  of  the  possible  changes  in  the  dust  we  tread  on. 

'  Exclusive  of  animal  decay,  we  can  hardly  arrive  at  a  more 
absolute  type  of  impurity,  than  the  mud  or  slime  of  a  damp, 
over-trodden  path,  in  the  outskirts  of  a  manufacturing  town. 
I  do  not  say  mud  of  the  road,  because  that  is  mixed  with 
animal  refuse  ;  but  take  merely  an  ounce  or  two  of  the  blackest 
slime  of  a  beaten  footpath,  on  a  rainy  day,  near  a  manufactur- 
ing town.  That  slime  we  shall  find  in  most  cases  composed  of 
clay  (or  brickdust,  which  is  burnt  clay),  mixed  with  soot,  a 
little  sand  and  water.  All  these  elements  are  at  helpless  wrar 
wTith  each  other,  and  destroy  reciprocally  each  other's  nature 
and  power :  competing  and  fighting  for  place  at  every  tread 
of  your  foot  ;  sand  squeezing  out  clay,  and  clay  squeezing 
out  water,  and  soot  meddling  everywhere,  and  defiling  the 
whole.  Let  us  suppose  that  this  ounce  of  mud  is  left  in 
perfect  rest,  and  that  its  elements  gather  together,  like  to 
like,  so  that  their  atoms  may  get  into  the  closest  relations 
possible. 

'  Let  the  clay  begin.  Kidding  itself  of  all  foreign  substance, 
it  gradually  becomes  a  white  earth,  already  very  beautiful, 
and  fit,  with  help  of  congealing  fire,  to  be  made  into  finest 
porcelain,  and  painted  on,  and  be  kept  in  kings'  palaces. 
But  such  artificial  consistence  is  not  its  best.  Leave  it  still 
quiet,  to  follow7  its  own  instinct  of  unity,  and  it  becomes,  not 
only  white  but  clear  ;  not  only  clear,  but  hard  ;  nor  only 
clear  and  hard,  but  so  set  that  it  can  deal  with  light  in  a 
wonderful  way,  and  gather  out  of  it  the  loveliest  blue  rays 
only,  refusing  the  rest.    We  call  it  then  a  sapphire. 

4  Such  being  the  consummation  of  the  clay,  we  give  similar 
permission  of  quiet  to  the  sand.  It  also  becomes,  first,  a 
white  earth ;  then  proceeds  to  grow7  clear  and  hard,  and  at 
last  arranges  itself  in  mysterious,  infinitely  fine  parallel  lines, 
which  have  the  power  of  reflecting,  not  merely  the  blue  rays, 
but  the  blue,  green,  purple,  and  red  rays,  in  the  greatest 
beauty  in  which  they  can  be  seen  through  any  hard  material 
whatsoever.    We  call  it  then  an  opal. 

'  In  next  order  the  soot  sets  to  work.  It  cannot  make  itself 
white  at  first  ;  but,  instead  of  being  discouraged,  tries  harder 
and  harder ;  and  comes  out  clear  at  last ;  and  the  hardest 


142 


THE  ETHICS  OF  THE  DUST. 


thing  in  the  world :  and  for  the  blackness  that  it  had,  obtaine 
in  exchange  the  power  of  reflecting  all  the  rays  of  the  sun  at 
once,  in  the  viviclest  blaze  that  any  solid  thing  can  shoot.  We 
call  it  then  a  diamond. 

£  Last  of  all,  the  water  purifies,  or  unites  itself ;  contented 
enough  if  it  only  reach  the  form  of  a  dewdrop  :  but,  if  we 
insist  on  its  proceeding  to  a  more  perfect  consistence,  it  crys- 
tallises into  the  shape  of  a  star.  And,  for  the  ounce  of  slime 
which  we  had  by  political  economy  of  competition,  we  have, 
by  political  economy  of  co-operation,  a  sapphire,  an  opal,  and 
a  diamond,  set  in  the  midst  of  a  star  of  snow.' 

L.  I  have  asked  you  to  hear  that,  children,  because,  from 
all  that  we  have  seen  in  the  work  and  play  of  these  past  days, 
I  would  have  you  gain  at  least  one  grave  and  enduring  thought. 
The  seeming  trouble, — the  unquestionable  degradation, — of 
the  elements  of  the  physical  earth,  must  passively  wait  the  ap- 
pointed time  of  their  repose,  or  their  restoration.  It  can  only  be 
brought  about  for  them  by  the  agency  of  external  law.  But  if,  in- 
deed, there  be  a  nobler  life  in  us  than  in  these  strangely  mov- 
ing atoms ; — if,  indeed,  there  is  an  eternal  difference  between 
the  fire  which  inhabits  them,  and  that  which  animates  us, — it 
must  be  shown,  by  each  of  us  in  his  appointed  place,  not 
merely  in  the  patience,  but  in  the  activity  of  our  hope ;  not 
merely  by  our  desire,  but  our  labour,  for  the  time  when  the 
Dust  of  the  generations  of  men  shall  be  confirmed  for  founda- 
tions of  the  gates  of  the  city  of  God.  The  human  clay,  now 
trampled  and  despised,  will  not  be, — cannot  be, — knit  into 
strength  and  light  by  accident  or  ordinances  of  unassisted 
fate.  By  human  cruelty  and  iniquity  it  has  been  afflicted  ;— 
by  human  mercy  and  justice  it  must  be  raised :  and,  in  all 
fear  or  questioning  of  what  is  or  is  not,  the  real  message  of 
creation,  or  of  revelation,  you  may  assuredly  find  perfect 
peace,  if  you  are  resolved  to  do  that  which  your  Lord  has 
plainly  required, — and  content  that  He  should  indeed  require 
no  more  of  you, — than  to  do  Justice,  to  love  Mercy,  and  tc 
walk  humbly  with  Him. 


NOTES. 


Note  I. 

*.  Page  24. 

*  TJiat  third  pyramid  of  hsrs.' 

Throughout  the  dialogues,  it  must  be  observed  that  'Sibyl*  is  ad« 
dressed  (when  in  play)  as  having  once  been  the  Cumsean  Sibyl ;  and 
'  Egypt '  as  having  been  queen  Nitocris, — the  Cinderella,  and  '  the 
greatest  heroine  and  beauty  '  of  Egyptian  story.  The  Egyptians  called 
her  4  Neith  the  Victorious '  (Nitocris),  and  the  Greeks  4  Face  of  the 
Rose '  (Rhodope).  Chaucer's  beautiful  conception  of  Cleopatra  in  the 
4  Legend  of  Good  Women,'  is  much  more  founded  on  the  traditions  of 
her  than  on  those  of  Cleopatra  ;  and,  especially  in  its  close,  modified  by 
Herodotus's  terrible  story  of  the  death  of  Nitocris,  which,  however,  is 
mythologically  nothing  more  than  a  part  of  the  deep  monotonous 
ancient  dirge  for  the  fulfilment  of  the  earthly  destiny  of  Beauty  ;  '  She 
cast  herself  into  a  chamber  full  of  ashes.' 

I  believe  this  Queen  is  now  sufficiently  ascertained  to  have  either 
built,  or  increased  to  double  its  former  size,  the  third  pyramid  of 
Gizeh  :  and  the  passage  following  in  the  text  refers  to  an  imaginary 
endeavour,  by  the  Old  Lecturer  and  the  children  together,  to  make  out 
the  description  of  that  pyramid  in  the  16?th  page  of  the  second  volume 
of  Bunsen's  '  Egypt's  Place  in  Universal  History' — ideal  endeavour,— 
which  ideally  terminates  as  the  Old  Lecturer's  real  endeavours  to  the 
same  end  always  have  terminated.  There  are,  however,  valuable  notes 
respecting  Nitocris  at  page  210  of  the  same  volume :  but  the  1  Early 
Egyptian  History  for  the  Young,'  by  the  author  of  Sidney  Gray,  con- 
tains, in  a  pleasant  form,  as  much  information  as  young  readers  will 
usually  need. 

Note  II. 

Page  25. 

'  Pyramid  of  Asychis.' 

This  pyramid,  in  mythology,  divides  with  the  Tower  of  Babel  the 
shame,  or  vain  glory,  of  being  presumptuously,  and  first  among  great 
edifices,  built  with  (  brick  for  stone.'  This  was  the  inscription  on  it 
according  to  Herodotus :-— < 


144 


XOTES. 


1  Despise  me  not,,  in  comparing  me  with  the  pyramids  of  stone  ;  fot 
I  have  the  pre-eminence  over  them,  as  far  as  Jupiter  has  pre- 
eminence over  the  gods.  For,  striking  with  staves  into  the  pool, 
men  gathered  the  clay  which  fastened  itself  to  the  staff,  and 
kneaded  bricks  out  of  it,  and  so  made  me.' 

The  word  I  have  translated  '  kneaded 1  is  literally  1  drew  ; '  in  the  sense 
of  drawing,  for  which  the  Latins  used  '  duco  ; '  and  thus  gave  us  our 
1  ductile '  in  speaking  of  dead  clay,  and  Duke,  Doge,  or  leader,  in  speak- 
ing of  living  clay.  As  the  asserted  pre-eminence  of  the  edifice  is  made, 
in  this  inscription,  to  rest  merely  on  the  quantity  of  labour  consumed 
in  it,  this  pyramid  is  considered,  in  the  text,  as  the  type,  at  once,  of 
the  base  building,  and  of  the  lost  labour,  of  future  ages,  so  far  at  least 
as  the  spirits  of  measured  and  mechanical  effort  deal  with  it :  but  Neith, 
exercising  her  power  upon  it,  makes  it  a  type  of  the  work  of  wise  and 
inspired  builders. 

Note  III. 

Page  25. 

J  The  Greater  PtlmJi.' 

It  is  impossible,  as  yet,  to  define  with  distinctness  the  personal  agencies* 
of  the  Egyptian  deities.  They  aie  continually  associated  in  function, 
or  hold  derivative  powers,  or  are  related  to  each  other  in  mysterious 
triads  ;  uniting  always  symbolism  of  physical  phenomena  with  real 
spiritual  power.  I  have  endeavoured  partly  to  explain  this  in  the  text 
of  the  tenth  Lecture  :  here,  it  is  only  necessary  for  the  reader  to  know 
that  the  Greater  Pthah  more  or  less  represents  the  formative  power  of 
order  and  measurement :  he  always  stands  on  a  four-square  pedestal, 

*  the  Egyptian  cubit,  metaphorically  used  as  the  hieroglyphic  for  truth  ; ' 
his  limbs  are  bound  together,  to  signify  fixed  stability,  as  of  a  pillar  ;  he 
has  a  measuring-rod  in  his  hand  ;  and  at  Philae,  is  represented  as  hold- 
ing an  egg  on  a  potter's  wheel  •  but  I  do  not  know  if  this  symbol  occurs 
in  older  sculptures.  His  usual  title  is  the  '  Lord  of  Truth.*  Others, 
very  beautiful :  4  King  of  the  Two  Worlds,  of  Gracious  Countenance,' 

•  Superintendent  of  the  Great  Abode,' &c,  are  given  by  Mr.  Birch  in 
Arundale's  '  Gallery  of  Antiquities,'  which  I  suppose  is  the  book  of  best 
authority  easily  accessible.  For  the  full  titles  and  utterances  of  the 
gods,  Rosellini  is  as  yet  the  only— and  I  believe,  still  a  very  question- 
able—authority ;  and  Arundale's  little  book,  excellent  in  the  text,  has 
this  great  defect,  that  its  drawings  give  the  statues  invariably  a  ludi- 
crous or  ignoble  character.  Readers  who  have  not  access  to  the  originals 
must  be  warned  against  this  frequent  fault  in  modern  illustration  (espe- 
cially existing  also  in  some  of  the  painted  casts  of  Gothic  and  Normai> 


NOT  Ed. 


145 


work  at  the  Crystal  Palace).  Jt  is  not  owing  to  any  wilful  want  of 
veracity :  the  plates  in  Arundale's  book  are  laboriously  faithful :  but 
the  expressions  of  both  face  and  body  in  a  figure  depend  merely  on 
emphasis  of  touch ;  and,  in  barbaric  art,  most  draughtsmen  emphasise 
what  they  plainly  see — the  barbarism  ;  and  miss  conditions  of  noble- 
ness, which  they  must  approach  the  monument  in  a  different  temper 
before  they  will  discover,  and  draw  with  great  subtlety  before  they  can 
express. 

The  character  of  the  Lower  Pthah,  or  perhaps  I  ought  rather  to  say, 
of  Pthah  in  his  lower  office,  is  sufficiently  explained  in  the  text  of  the 
third  Lecture  ;  only  the  reader  must  be  warned  that  the  Egyptian 
symbolism  of  him  by  the  beetle  was  not  a  scornful  one ;  it  expressed 
only  the  idea  of  his  presence  in  the  first  elements  of  life.  But  it  may 
not  unjustly  be  used,  in  another  sense,  by  us,  who  have  seen  his  power 
in  new  development ;  and,  even  as  it  was,  I  cannot  conceive  that  the 
Egyptians  should  have  regarded  their  beetle-headed  image  of  him 
(Champoliion,  '  Pantheon, '  pi.  12),  without  some  occult  scorn.  It  is  the 
most  painful  of  all  their  types  of  any  beneficent  power  ;  and  even 
among  those  of  evil  influences,  none  can  be  compared  with  it,  except 
its  opposite,  the  tortoise-headed  demon  of  indolence. 

Pasht  (p.  24,  line  32)  is  connected  with  the  Greek  Artemis,  especially 
in  her  offices  of  judgment  and  vengeance.  She  is  usually  lioness- 
headed  ;  sometimes  cat-headed  •  her  attributes  seeming  often  trivial  or 
ludicrous  unless  their  full  meaning  is  known  ;  but  the  enquiry  is  much 
too  wide  to  be  followed  here.  The  cat  was  sacred  to  her  ;  or  rather  to 
the  sun,  and  secondarily  to  her.  She  is  alluded  to  in  the  text  because 
she  is  always  the  companion  of  Pthah  (called  '  the  beloved  of  Pthah, * 
it  may  be  as  Judgment,  demanded  and  longed  for  by  Truth's ;  and  it 
may  be  well  for  young  readers  to  have  this  fixed  in  their  minds,  even 
by  chance  association.  There  are  more  statues  of  Pasht  in  the  British 
Museum  than  of  any  other  Egyptian  deity  ;  several  of  them  fine  in 
workmanship;  nearly  all  in  dark  stone,  which  may  be,  presumably,  to 
connect  her,  as  the  moon,  with  the  night ;  and  in  her  office  of  avenger, 
with  grief. 

Thoth  (p.  27,  line  17),  is  the  Recording  Angel  of  Judgment ;  and  the 
Greek  Hermes  Phre  (line  20),  is  the  Sun. 

Neith  is  the  Egyptian  spirit  of  divine  wisdom  ;  and  the  Athena  of  the 
Greeks.  No  sufficient  statement  of  her  many  attributes,  still  less  of  their 
meanings,  can  be  shortly  given  ;  but  this  should  be  noted  respecting 
the  veiling  of  the  Egyptian  image  of  her  by  vulture  wings— that  as  she 
is,  physically,  the  goddess  of  the  air,  this  bird,  the  most  powerful  creat- 
ure of  the  air  known  to  the  Egyptians,  naturally  became  her  symbol. 
It  had  other  significations  ;  but  certainly  this,  when  in  connection  with 
Keith.  As  representing  her,  it  was  the  most  important  sign,  next  to  the 
winged  sphere,  in  Egyptian  sculpture  ;  and,  just  as  in  Homer,  Athena 


146 


NOTES. 


herself  guides  her  heroes  into  battle,  this  symbol  of  wisdom,  giving  vie 
tory,  floats  over  the  heads  of  the  Egyptian  kings.  The  Greeks,  repre* 
renting  the  goddess  herself  in  human  form,  yet  would  not  lose  the 
power  of  the  Egyptian  symbol,  and  changed  it  into  an  angel  of  victory. 
First  seen  in  loveliness  on  the  early  coins  of  Syracuse  and  Leontium,  it 
gradually  became  the  received  sign  of  all  conquest,  and  the  so-called 
4  Victory '  of  later  times ;  which,  little  by  little,  loses  its  truth,  and  is 
accepted  by  the  moderns  only  as  a  personification  of  victory  itself, — not 
as  an  actual  picture  of  the  living  Angel  who  led  to  victory.  There  is  a 
wide  difference  between  these  two  conceptions, — all  the  difference  be- 
tween insincere  poetry,  and  sincere  religion.  This  I  have  also  endeav- 
oured farther  to  illustrate  in  the  tenth  Lecture  ;  there  is  however  one 
part  ®f  Athena's  character  which  it  would  have  been  irrelevant  to  dweU 
upon  there  ;  yet  which  I  must  not  wholly  leave  unnoticed. 

As  the  goddess  of  the  air.  she  physically  represents  both  its  beneficent 
calm,  and  necessary  tempest:  other  storm-deities  (as  Chrysaor  and 
^Eolus)  being  invested  with  a  subordinate  and  more  or  less  malignant 
function,  which  is  exclusively  their  own,  and  is  related  to  that  of 
Athena  as  the  power  of  Mars  is  related  to  hers  in  war.  So  also  Virgil 
makes  her  able  to  wield  the  lightning  herself,  while  Juno  cannot,  but 
must  pray  for  the  intervention  of  iEolus.  She  has  precisely  the  corre- 
spondent moral  authority  over  calmness  of  mind,  and  just  anger.  She 
soothes  Achilles,  as  she  incites  Tydides  ;  her  physical  power  over  the 
air  being  always  hinted  correlatively.  She  grasps  Achilles  by  his  hair — 
as  the  wind  would  lift  it— softly, 

1  It  fanned  his  check,  it  raised  his  hair, 
Like  a  meadow  gale  in  spring.1 

She  does  not  merely  turn  the  lance  of  Mars  from  Diomed  ;  but  seizes  it 
in  both  her  hands,  and  casts  it  aside,  with  a  sense  of  making  it  vain, 
like  chaff  in  the  wind; — to  the  shout  of  Achilles,  she  adds  her  own 
voice  of  storm  in  heaven — but  in  all  cases  the  moral  power  is  still  the 
principal  one — most  beautifully  in  that  seizing  of  Achilles  by  the  hair, 
which  was  the  talisman  of  his  life  (because  he  had  vowed  it  to  the 
Sperchius  if  he  returned  in  safety),  and  which,  in  giving  at  Patroclus' 
tomb,  he,  knowingly,  yields  up  the  hope  of  return  to  his  country,  and 
signifies  that  he  will  die  with  his  friend.  Achilles  and  Tydides  are, 
above  all  other  heroes,  aided  by  her  in  war,  because  their  prevailing 
characters  are  the  desire  of  justice,  united  in  both  with  deep  affections  ; 
and,  in  Achilles,  with  a  passionate  tenderness,  which  is  the  real  root  of 
his  passionate  anger.  Ulysses  is  her  favourite  chiefly  in  her  office  as 
the  goddess  of  conduct  and  design. 


NOTES. 


147 


Note  IV. 

Page  54. 
'  Geometrical  limitations.1 

Et  is  difficult,  without  a  tedious  accuracy,  or  without  full  illustration,  to 
express  the  complete  relations  of  crystalline  structure,  which  dispose 
minerals  to  take,  at  different  times,  fibrous,  massive,  or  foliated  forms ; 
and  I  am  afraid  this  chapter  will  be  generally  skipped  by  the  reader : 
yet  the  arrangement  itself  will  be  found  useful,  if  kept  broadly  in 
mind  ;  and  the  transitions  of  state  are  of  the  highest  interest,  if  the  sub- 
ject is  entered  upon  with  any  earnestness.  It  would  have  been  vain  to 
add  to  the  scheme  of  this  little  volume  any  account  of  the  geometrical 
forms  of  crystals  :  an  available  one,  though  still  far  too  difficult  and  too 
copious,  has  been  arranged  by  the  Rev.  Mr.  Mitchell,  for  Orr's  '  Circle 
of  the  Sciences';  and,  I  believe,  the  'nets'  of  crystals,  which  are 
therein  given  to  be  <3ut  out  with  scissors  and  put  prettily  together,  will 
be  found  more  conquerable  by  young  ladies  than  by  other  studenU. 
They  should  also,  when  an  opportunity  occurs,  he  shown,  at  any  public 
library,  the  diagram  of  the  crystallisation  of  quartz  referred  to  poles,  at 
p.  8  of  Cloizaux's  '  Manuel  de  Mineralogie  ' :  that  they  may  know  what 
work  is ;  and  what  the  subject  is. 

With  a  view  to  more  careful  examination  of  the  nascent  states  of 
silica,  I  have  made  no  allusion  in  this  volume  to  the  influence  of  mere 
segregation,  as  connected  with  the  crystalline  power.  It  has  only  been 
recently,  during  the  study  of  the  breccias  alluded  to  in  page  113,  that  I 
have  fully  seen  the  extent  to  which  this  singular  force  often  modifies 
rocks  in  which  at  first  its  influence  might  hardly  have  been  suspected  ; 
many  apparent  conglomerates  being  in  reality  formed  chiefly  by  segre- 
gation, combined  with  mysterious  brokenly  zoned  structures,  like  those 
of  some  malachites.  I  hope  some  day  to  know  more  of  these  and  sev- 
eral other  mineral  phenomena  (especially  of  those  connected  with  the 
relative  sizes  of  crystals),  which  otherwise  I  should  have  endeavoured 
fco  describe  in  this  volume. 


Note  V. 

Page  102. 
*  St.  Barbara. 9 

1  would  have  given  the  legends  of  St.  Barbara,  and  St.  Thomas,  if  1 
had  thought  it  always  well  for  young  readers  to  have  everything  at  once 
told  them  which  they  may  wish  to  know.  They  will  remember  the 
stories  better  after  taking  some  trouble  to  find  them ;  and  the  text  is  in 


148 


NOTES. 


telligible  enough  as  it  stands.  The  idea  of  St.  Barbara,  as  there  given 
5s  founded  partly  on  her  legend  in  Peter  de  Natalibus,  partly  on  the 
beautiful  photograph  of  Van  Eyck's  picture  of  her  at  Antwerp :  which 
was  sonic  time  since  published  at  Lille. 


Note  VI. 

Page  137. 

'  King  of  the  Valley  of  Diamonds.* 

Isabel  interrupted  the  Lecturer  here,  and  was  briefly  bid  to  hold  hei 
tongue  ;  which  gave  rise  to  some  talk,  apart,  afterwards,  between  L. 
and  Sibyl,  of  which  a  word  or  two  may  be  perhaps  advisably  set  down. 

Sibyl.  We  shall  spoil  Isabel,  certainly,  if  we  don't  mind:  I  was  glad 
you  stopped  her,  and  yet  sorry  ;  for  she  wanted  so  much  to  ask  about 
the  Valley  of  Diamonds  again,  and  she  has  worked  so  hard  at  it,  and 
made  it  nearly  all  out  by  herself.  She  recollected  Elisha's  throwing  in 
the  meal,  which  nobody  else  did. 

L.  But  what  did  she  want  to  ask  ? 

Sibyl.  About  the  mulberry  trees  and  the  serpents  ;  we  are  all  stopped 
by  that.    Won't  you  tell  us  what  it  means  ? 

L.  Now,  Sibyl,  I  am  sure  you,  who  never  explained  yourself,  should 
be  the  last  to  expect  others  to  do  so.    I  hate  explaining  myself. 

Sibyl.  And  yet  how  often  you  complain  of  other  people  for  not  say- 
ing what  they  meant.  How  I  have  heard  you  growl  over  the  three 
stone  steps  to  purgatory  ;  for  instance  ! 

L.  Yes;  because  Dante's  meaning  is  worth  getting  at ;  but  mine  mat- 
ters nothing :  at  least,  if  ever  I  think  it  is  of  any  consequence,  I  speak 
it  as  clearly  as  may  be.  But  you  may  make  anything  you  like  of  the 
serpent  forests.  I  could  have  helped  you  to  find  out  what  they  were, 
by  giving  a  little  more  detail,  but  it  would  have  been  tiresome. 

Sibyl.  It  if  much  more  tiresome  not  to  find  out.  Tell  us,  please,  as 
Isabel  says,  because  we  feel  so  stupid. 

L.  There  is  no  stupidity  ;  you  could  not  possibly  do  more  than  guess 
at  anything  so  vague.  But  I  think,  you,  Sibyl,  at  least,  might  have 
recollected  what  first  dyed  the  mulberry  ? 

Sibyl.  So  I  did  ;  but  that  helped  little  ;  I  thought  of  Dante's  forest 
of  suicides,  too,  but  you  would  not  simply  have  borrowed  that  ? 

L.  No.  If  I  had  had  strength  to  use  it,  I  should  have  stolen  it,  to 
beat  into  another  shape  ;  not  borrowed  it.  But  that  idea  of  souls  in 
trees  is  as  old  as  the  world  ;  or  at  least,  as  the  world  of  man.  And  I  did 
mean  that  there  were  souls  in  those  dark  branches  ;  the  souls  of  all 
those  who  had  perished  in  misery  through  the  pursuit  of  riches ;  and 
that  the  river  was  of  their  blood,  gathering  gradually,  and  flowing  out 


NOTES. 


149 


of  the  valley.  That  I  meant  the  serpents  for  the  souls  of  those  who  had 
lived  carelessly  and  wantonly  in  their  riches  ;  and  who  have  all  their 
sins  forgiven  by  the  world,  because  they  are  rich:  and  therefore  they 
have  seven  crimson  crested  heads,  for  the  seven  mortal  sins  ;  of  which 
they  are  proud :  and  these,  and  the  memory  and  report  of  them,  are  the 
chief  causes  of  temptation  to  others,  as  showing  the  pleasantness  and  ab- 
solving power  of  riches  ;  so.  that  thus  they  are  singing  serpents.  And 
the  worms  are  the  souls  of  the  common  money-getters  and  traffickers, 
who  do  nothing  but  eat  and  spin  :  and  who  gain  habitually  by  the  dis- 
tress or  foolishness  of  others  (as  you  see  the  butchers  have  been  gaining 
out  of  the  panic  at  the  cattle  plague,  among  the  poor), — so  they  are  made 
to  eat  the  dark  leaves,  and  spin,  and  perish. 

Sibyl.  And  the  souls  of  the  great,  cruel,  rich  people  who  oppress  the 
poor,  and  lend  money  to  government  to  make  unjust  war,  where  are 
they  ? 

L.  They  change  into  the  ice,  I  believe,  and  are  knit  with  the  gold ; 
and  make  the  grave-dust  of  the  valley.  I  believe  so,  at  least,  for  no  one 
ever  sees  those  souls  anywhere. 

(Sibyl  censes  questioning.) 

Isabel  (who  has  crept  up  to  her  side  without  any  one's  seeing).  Oh, 
Sibyl,  please  ask  him  about  the  fire-Hies  ! 

L.  What,  you  there,  mousie !  No  ;  I  won't  tell  either  Sibyl  or  you 
about  the  fire-flies  ;  nor  a  word  more  about  anything  else.  You  ought 
to  be  little  fire-Hies  yourselves,  and  find  your  way  in  twilight  by  your 
own  wits 

Isabel.  But  you  said  they  burned,  you  know  ? 

L.  Yes ;  and  you  may  be  fire-flies  that  way  too,  some  of  you,  before 
long,  though  I  did  not  mean  that.  Away  with  you,  children.  You 
have  thought  enough  for  to  day. 


NOTE  TO  SECOND  EDITION. 

Sentence  out  of  letter  from  May  (who  is  staying  with  Isabel  just  now 
at  Cassel),  dated  15th  June,  1877  :  — 

"J  am  reading  the  Ethics  with  a  nice  Irish  girl  who  is  staying  here, 
and  she's  just  as  puzzled  as  I've  always  been  about  the  fire-flies,  and  we 
both  want  to  know  so  much. — Please  be  a  very  nice  old  Lecturer,  and 
tell  us,  won't  you  ?  " 

Well,  May,  you  never  were  a  vain  girl  ;  so  could  scarcely  guess  that  I 
meant  them  for  the  light,  unpursued  vanities,  which  yet  blind  us,  con- 
fused among  the  stars.  One  evening,  as  I  came  late  into  Siena,  the 
fire-flies  were  flying  high  on  a  stormy  sirocco  wind, — the  stars  themselves 
no  brighter,  and  all  their  host  seeming,  at  moments,  to  fade  as  the  in' 
S3cts  faded. 


FICTION  FAIR  AND  FOUL 


FICTION— FAIR  AND  FOUL. 


On  the  first  mild — or,  at  least,  the  first  bright — day  of 
March,  in  this  year,  I  walked  through  what  was  once  a 
country  lane,  between  the  hostelry  of  the  Half -moon  at  the 
bottom  of  Herne  Hill,  and  the  secluded  College  of  Dulwich. 

In  my  young  days,  Croxsted  Lane  was  a  green  bye-road 
traversable  for  some  distance  by  carts ;  but  rarely  so  trav- 
ersed, and,  for  the  most  part,  little  else  than  a  narrow  strip 
of  untilled  field,  separated  by  blackberry  hedges  from  the 
better  cared- for  meadows  on  each  side  of  it :  growing  more 
weeds,  therefore,  than  they,  and  perhaps  in  spring  a  primrose 
or  two — white  archangel — daisies  plenty,  and  purple  thistles 
in  autumn.  A  slender  rivulet,  boasting  little  of  its  bright- 
ness, for  there  are  no  springs  at  Dulwich,  yet  fed  purely 
enough  by  the  rain  and  morning  dew,  here  trickled — there 
loitered — through  the  long  grass  beneath  the  hedges,  and 
expanded  itself,  where  it  might,  into  moderately  clear  and 
deep  pools,  in  which,  under  their  veils  of  duck-weed,  a  fresh- 
water shell  or  two,  sundry  curious  little  skipping  shrimps, 
any  quantity  of  tadpoles  in  their  time,  and  even  sometimes  a 
tittlebat,  offered  themselves  to  my  boyhood's  pleased,  and  not 
inaccurate,  observation.  There,  my  mother  and  I  used  to 
gather  the  first  buds  of  the  hawthorn  ;  and  there,  in  after 
years,  I  used  to  walk  in  the  summer  shadows,  as  in  a  place 
wilder  and  sweeter  than  our  garden,  to  think  over  any 
passage  I  wanted  to  make  better  than  usual  in  Modern 
Painters. 

So,  as  aforesaid,  on  the  first  kindly  day  of  this  year,  being 
thoughtful  more  than  usual  of  those  old  times,  I  went  to  look 
again  at  the  place. 


154 


FICTION- FAIR  AND  FOUL. 


Often,  both  in  those  clays,  and  since,  I  have  put  myself 
hard  to  it,  vainly,  to  find  words  wherewith  to  tell  of  beautiful 
tilings  ;  but  beauty  has  been  in  the  world  since  the  world 
was  made,  and  human  language  can  make  a  shift,  somehow, 
to  give  account  of  it,  whereas  the  peculiar  forces  of  devasta- 
tion induced  by  modern  city  life  have  only  entered  the  world 
lately  ;  and  no  existing  terms  of  language  known  to  me  are 
enough  to  describe  the  forms  of  filth,  and  modes  of  ruin,  that 
varied  themselves  along  the  course  of  Croxsted  Lane.  The 
fields  on  each  side  of  it  are  now  mostly  dug  up  for  building, 
or  cut  through  into  gaunt  corners  and  nooks  of  blind  ground 
by  the  wild  crossings  and  concurrencies  of  three  railroads. 
Half  a  dozen  handfuls  of  new  cottages,  with  Doric  doors, 
are  dropped  about  here  and  there  among  the  gashed  ground  : 
the  lane  itself,  now  entirely  grassless,  is  a  deep-rutted,  heavy- 
hillocked  cart-road,  diverging  gatelessly  into  various  brick- 
fields or  pieces  of  waste  ;  and  bordered  on  each  side  by  heaps 
of — Hades  only  knows  what ! — mixed  dust  of  every  unclean 
thing  that  can  crumble  in  drought,  and  mildew  of  every  unclean 
thing  that  can  rot  or  rust  in  damp :  ashes  and  rags,  beer-bottles 
and  old  shoes,  battered  pans,  smashed  crockery,  shreds  of 
nameless  clothes,  door-sweepings,  floor-sweepings,  kitchen  gar- 
bage, back-garden  sewage,  old  iron,  rotten  timber  jagged  with 
out-torn  nails,  cigar-ends,  pipe-bowls,  cinders,  bones,  and  ord- 
ure, indescribable  ;  and,  variously  kneaded  into,  sticking  to,  or 
fluttering  foully  here  and  there  over  all  these, — remnants 
broadcast,  of  every  manner  of  newspaper,  advertisement  or 
big-lettered  bill,  festering  and  flaunting  out  their  last  pub- 
licity in  the  pits  of  stinking  dust  and  mortal  slime. 

The  lane  ends  now  where  its  prettiest  windings  once  began  ; 
being  cut  off  by  a  cross-road  leading  out  of  Dulwich  to  a  minor 
railway  station  :  and  on  the  other  side  of  this  road,  what  was 
of  old  the  daintiest  intricacy  of  its  solitude  is  changed  into  a 
straight,  and  evenly  macadamised  carriage  drive,  between  new 
houses  of  extreme  respectability,  with  good  attached  gardens 
and  offices — most  of  these  tenements  being  larger — all  more 
pretentious,  and  many,  I  imagine,  held  at  greatly  higher  rent 
than  my  father's,  tenanted  for  twenty  years  at  Heme  HilL 


FICTION— FAIR  AND  FOUL. 


155 


And  it  became  matter  of  curious  meditation  to  me  what  must 
here  become  of  children  resembling  my  poor  little  dreamy 
quondam  self  in  temper,  and  thus  brought  up  at  the  same  dis- 
tance from  London,  and  in  the  same  or  better  circumstances  of 
worldly  fortune  ;  but  with  only  Croxsted  Lane  in  its  present 
condition  for  their  country  walk.  The  trimly  kept  road  be- 
fore their  doors,  such  as  one  used  to  see  in  the  fashionable 
suburbs  of  Cheltenham  or  Leamington,  presents  nothing  to 
their  study  but  gravel,  and  gas-lamp  posts  ;  the  modern  ad- 
dition of  a  vermilion  letter-pillar  contributing  indeed  to  the 
splendour,  but  scarcely  to  the  interest  of  the  scene  ;  and  a 
child  of  any  sense  or  fancy  would  hastily  contrive  escape  from 
such  a  barren  desert  of  politeness,  and  betake  itself  to  investi- 
gation, such  as  might  be  feasible,  of  the  natural  history  of 
Croxsted  Lane. 

But,  for  its  sense  or  fancy,  what  food,  or  stimulus,  can  it 
find,  in  that  foul  causeway  of  its  youthful  pilgrimage  ?  What 
would  have  happened  to  myself,  so  directed,  I  cannot  clearly 
imagine.  Possibly,  I  might  have  got  interested  in  the  old 
iron  and  wood-shavings  ;  and  become  an  engineer  or  a  car- 
penter :  but  for  the  children  of  to-day,  accustomed  from  the 
instant  they  are  out  of  their  cradles,  to  the  sight  of  this  in- 
finite nastiness,  prevailing  as  a  fixed  condition  of  the  universe, 
over  the  face  of  nature,  and  accompanying  all  the  operations 
of  industrious  man,  what  is  to  be  the  scholastic  issue?  unless, 
indeed,  the  thrill  of  scientific  vanity  in  the  primary  analysis 
of  some  unheard-of  process  of  corruption — or  the  reward  of 
microscopic  research  in  the  sight  of  worms  with  more  legs, 
and  acari  of  more  curious  generation  than  ever  vivified  the 
more  simply  smelling  plasma  of  antiquity. 

One  result  of  such  elementary  education  is,  however,  al- 
ready certain  ;  namely,  that  the  pleasure  which  we  may  con- 
ceive taken  by  the  children  of  the  coming  time,  in  the  analysis 
of  physical  corruption,  guides,  into  fields  more  dangerous  and 
desolate,  the  expatiation  of  imaginative  literature  :  and  that 
the  reactions  of  moral  disease  upon  itself,  and  the  conditions 
of  languidly  monstrous  character  developed  in  an  atmosphere 
of  low  vitality,  have  become  the  most  valued  material  of  mod- 


156 


FICTION— FAIR  AND  FOUL. 


ern  fiction,  and  the  most  eagerly  discussed  texts  of  modern 
philosophy. 

The  many  concurrent  reasons  for  this  mischief  may,  I 
believe,  be  massed  under  a  few  general  heads. 

I.  There  is  first  the  hot  fermentation  and  unwholesome 
secrecy  of  the  population  crowded  into  large  cities,  each  mote 
in  the  misery  lighter,  as  an  individual  soul,  than  a  dead  leaf, 
but  becoming  oppressive  and  infectious  each  to  his  neighbour, 
in  the  smoking  mass  of  decay.  The  resulting  modes  of  men- 
tal ruin  and  distress  are  continually  new ;  and  in  a  certain 
sense,  worth  study  in  their  monstrosity  :  they  have  accordingly 
developed  a  corresponding  science  of  fiction,  concerned  mainly 
with  the  description  of  such  forms  of  disease,  like  the  botany 
of  leaf-lichens. 

In  De  Balzac's  story  of  Father  Goriot,  a  grocer  makes  a 
large  fortune,  of  which  he  spends  on  himself  as  much  as  may 
keep  him  alive  ;  and  on  his  two  daughters,  all  that  can  pro- 
mote their  pleasures  or  their  pride.  He  marries  them  to  men 
of  rank,  supplies  their  secret  expenses,  and  provides  for  his 
favourite  a  separate  and  clandestine  establishment  with  her 
lover.  On  his  deathbed,  he  sends  for  this  favourite  daughter, 
who  wishes  to  come,  and  hesitates  for  a  quarter  of  an  hour 
between  doing  so,  and  going  to  a  ball  at  which  it  has  been  for 
the  last  month  her  chief  ambition  to  be  seen.  She  finally 
goes  to  the  ball. 

This  story  is,  of  course,  one  of  which  the  violent  contrasts 
and  spectral  catastrophe  could  only  take  place,  or  be  con- 
ceived, in  a  large  city.  A  village  grocer  cannot  make  a  large 
fortune,  cannot  marry  his  daughters  to  titled  squires,  and 
cannot  die  without  having  his  children  brought  to  him,  if  in 
the  neighbourhood,  by  fear  of  village  gossip,  if  for  no  better 
cause. 

II.  But  a  much  more  profound  feeling  than  this  mere 
curiosity  of  science  in  morbid  phenomena  is  concerned  in  the 
production  of  the  carefullest  forms  of  modern  fiction.  The 
disgrace  and  grief  resulting  from  the  mere  trampling  pressure 
and  electric  friction  of  town  life,  become  to  the  sufferers 
peculiarly  mysterious  in  their  undeservedness,  and  frightful 


FICTION— FAIR  AND  FOUL. 


157 


in  their  inevitableness.  The  power  of  all  surroundings  over 
them  for  evil ;  the  incapacity  of  their  own  minds  to  refuse  the 
pollution,  and  of  their  own  wills  to  oppose  the  weight,  of  the 
staggering  mass  that  chokes  and  crushes  them  into  perdition, 
brings  every  law  of  healthy  existence  into  question  with  them, 
and  every  alleged  method  of  help  and  hope  into  doubt.  In- 
dignation, without  any  calming  faith  in  justice,  and  self-con- 
tempt, without  any  curative  self-reproach,  dull  the  intelli- 
gence, and  degrade  the  conscience,  into  sullen  incredulity  of 
all  sunshine  outside  the  dunghill,  or  breeze  beyond  the  waft- 
ing of  its  impurity  ;  and  at  last  a  philosophy  develops  itself, 
partly  satiric,  partly  consolatory,  concerned  only  with  the 
regenerative  vigour  of  manure,  and  the  necessary  obscurities 
of  fimetic  Providence ;  showing  how  everybody's  fault  is 
somebody  else's,  how  infection  has  no  law,  digestion  no  will, 
and  profitable  dirt  no  dishonour. 

And  thus  an  elaborate  and  ingenious  scholasticism,  in  what 
may  be  called  the  Divinity  of  Decomposition,  has  established 
itself  in  connection  with  the  more  recent  forms  of  romance, 
giving  them  at  once  a  complacent  tone  of  clerical  dignity,  and 
an  agreeable  dash  of  heretical  impudence  ;  while  the  incul- 
cated doctrine  has  the  double  advantage  of  needing  no  labori- 
ous scholarship  for  its  foundation,  and  no  painful  self-denial 
for  its  practice. 

III.  The  monotony  of  life  in  the  central  streets  of  any  great 
modern  city,  but  especially  in  those  of  London,  where  every 
emotion  intended  to  be  derived  by  men  from  the  sight  of 
nature,  or  the  sense  of  art,  is  forbidden  for  ever,  leaves  the 
craving  of  the  heart  for  a  sincere,  yet  changeful,  interest,  to  be 
fed  from  one  source  only.  Under  natural  conditions  the 
degree  of  mental  excitement  necessary  to  bodily  health  is  pro- 
vided by  the  course  of  the  seasons,  and  the  various  skill  and 
fortune  of  agriculture.  In  the  country  every  morning  of  the 
year  brings  with  it  a  new  aspect  of  springing  or  fading 
nature  ;  a  new  duty  to  be  fulfilled  upon  earth,  and  a  new 
promise  or  warning  in  heaven.  No  day  is  without  its  inno- 
cent hope,  its  special  prudence,  its  kindly  gift,  and  its  sublime 
danger ;  and  in  every  process  of  wise  husbandry,  and  every 


158 


FICTION— FAIR  AND  FOUL. 


effort  of  contending  or  remedial  courage,  the  wholesome  pa& 
sions,  pride,  and  bodily  power  of  the  labourer  are  excited  and 
exerted  in  happiest  unison.  The  companionship  of  domestic, 
the  care  of  serviceable,  animals,  soften  and  enlarge  his  life 
with  lowly  charities,  and  discipline  him  in  familiar  wisdoms 
and  unboastful  fortitudes ;  while  the  divine  laws  of  seed-time 
which  cannot  be  recalled,  harvest  which  cannot  be  hastened, 
and  winter  in  which  no  man  can  work,  compel  the  impatiences 
and  coveting  of  his  heart  into  labour  too  submissive  to  be 
anxious,  and  rest  too  sweet  to  be  wanton.  "What  thought  can 
enough  comprehend  the  contrast  between  such  life,  and  that 
in  streets  where  summer  and  winter  are  only  alternations  of 
heat  and  cold  ;  where  snow  never  fell  white,  nor  sunshine 
clear  ;  where  the  ground  is  only  a  pavement,  and  the  sky  no 
more  than  the  glass  roof  of  an  arcade  ;  where  the  utmost 
power  of  a  storm  is  to  choke  the  gutters,  and  the  finest  magic 
of  spring,  to  change  mud  into  dust  :  where — chief  and  most 
fatal  difference  in  state,  there  is  no  interest  of  occupation  for 
any  of  the  inhabitants  but  the  routine  of  counter  or  desk 
within  doors,  and  the  effort  to  pass  each  other  without  col- 
lision outside  ;  so  that  from  morning  to  evening  the  only  pos- 
sible variation  of  the  monotony  of  the  hours,  and  lightening 
of  the  penalty  of  existence,  must  be  some  kind  of  mischief, 
limited,  unless  by  more  than  ordinary  godsend  of  fatality,  to 
the  fall  of  a  horse,  or  the  slitting  of  a  pocket. 

I  said  that  under  these  laws  of  inanition,  the  craving  of  the 
human  heart  for  some  kind  of  excitement  could  be  supplied 
from  one  source  only.  It  might  have  been  thought  by  any 
other  than  a  sternly  tentative  philosopher,  that  the  denial  of 
their  natural  food  to  human  feelings  would  have  provoked  a 
reactionary  desire  for  it :  and  that  the  dreariness  of  the  street 
would  have  been  gilded  by  dreams  of  pastoral  felicity.  Ex- 
perience has  shown  the  fact  to  be  otherwise  ;  the  thoroughly 
trained  Londoner  can  enjoy  no  other  excitement  than  that  to 
which  he  has  been  accustomed,  but  asks  for  that  in  continually 
more  ardent  or  more  virulent  concentration  ;  and  the  ulti- 
mate power  of  fiction  to  entertain  him  is  by  varying  to  his 
fancy  the  modes,  and  defining  for  his  dulness  the  horrors,  of 


FICTION— FAIR  AND  FOUL. 


169 


Death.  In  the  single  novel  of  Bleak  House  there  are  nine 
deaths  (or  left  for  death's,  in  the  drop  scene)  carefully  wrought 
out  or  led  up  to,  either  by  way  of  pleasing  surprise,  as  the 
baby's  at  the  brickmaker's,  or  finished  in  their  threatenings 
and  sufferings,  with  as  much  enjoyment  as  can  be  contrived 
in  the  anticipation,  and  as  much  pathology  as  can  be  concen- 
trated in  the  description.  Under  the  following  varieties  of 
method  : — 

One  by  assassination        .       .    Mr.  Tulkinghorn. 

One  by  starvation,  with  phthisis  Joe. 

One  by  chagrin        .       .       .  Richard. 

One  by  spontaneous  combustion    Mr.  Krook. 

One  by  sorrow         .       .       .    Lady  Dedlock's  lover. 

One  by  remorse        .       .       .    Lady  Dedlock. 

One  by  insanity        .       .       .    Miss  Flite. 

One  by  paralysis       .       .       .Sir  Leicester. 

Besides  the  baby,  by  fever,  and  a  lively  young  Frenchwoman 
left  to  be  hanged. 

And  all  this,  observe,  not  in  a  tragic,  adventurous,  or  mili- 
tary story,  but  merely  as  the  further  enlivenment  of  a  narrative 
intended  to  be  amusing  ;  and  as  a  properly  representative 
average  of  the  statistics  of  civilian  mortality  in  the  centre  of 
London. 

Observe  further,  and  chiefly.  It  is  not  the  mere  number  of 
deaths  (which,  if  we  count  the  odd  troopers  in  the  last  scene, 
is  exceeded  in  Old  Mortality,  and  reached,  within  one  or  two, 
both  in  Waverley  and  Guy  Mannering)  that  marks  the  peculiar 
tone  of  the  modern  novel.  It  is  the  fact  that  all  these  deaths, 
but  one,  are  of  inoffensive,  or  at  least  in  the  world's  estimate 
respectable  persons  ;  and  that  they  are  all  grotesquely  either 
violent  or  miserable,  purporting  thus  to  illustrate  the  modern 
theology  that  the  appointed  destiny  of  a  large  average  of  our 
population  is  to  die  like  rats  in  a  drain,  either  by  trap  or 
poison.  Not,  indeed,  that  a  lawyer  in  full  practice  can  be 
usually  supposed  as  faultless  in  the  eye  of  heaven  as  a  dove 
or  a  woodcock  ;  but  it  is  not,  in  former  divinities,  thought  the 


160 


FICTION— FAIR  AND  FOUL, 


will  of  Providence  that  he  should  be  dropped  by  a  shot  from 
a  client  behind  his  fire-screen,  and  retrieved  in  the  morning 
by  his  housemaid  under  the  chandelier.  Neither  is  Lady 
Dedlock  less  reprehensible  in  her  conduct  than  many  women 
of  fashion  have  been  and  will  be  :  but  it  would  not  therefore 
have  been  thought  poetically  just,  in  old-fashioned  morality, 
that  she  should  be  found  by  her  daughter  lying  dead,  with 
her  face  in  the  mud  of  a  St.  Giles's  churchyard. 

In  the  work  of  the  great  masters  death  is  always  either 
heroic,  deserved,  or  quiet  and  natural  (unless  their  purpose  be 
totally  and  deeply  tragic,  when  collateral  meaner  death  is  per- 
mitted, like  that  of  Polonius  or  Eoderigo).  In  Old  Mortality, 
four  of  the  deaths,  Bothwell's,  Ensign  Grahame's,  Macbriar's, 
and  Evandale's,  are  magnificently  heroic  ;  Burley's  and  Oli- 
phant's  long  deserved,  and  swift ;  the  troopers',  met  in  the 
discharge  of  their  military  duty,  and  the  old  miser's,  as  gentle 
as  the  passing  of  a  cloud,  and  almost  beautiful  in  its  last  words 
of — now  unselfish — care. 

'  Ailie '  (he  aye  ca'd  me  Ailie,  we  were  auld  acquaintance,)  'Ailie, 
take  ye  care  and  baud  tlie  gear  weel  thegither ;  for  the  name  of  Morton 
of  Miln wood's  gane  out  like  the  last  sough  of  an  auld  sang. '  And  sae 
he  fell  out  o'  ae  dwam  into  another,  and  ne'er  spak  a  word  mair,  unless 
it  were  something  we  cou'dna  mak  out,  about  a  dipped  candle  being 
gude  eneugh  to  see  to  dee  wi\  He  cou'd  ne'er  bide  to  see  a  moulded 
ane,  and  there  was  ane,  by  ill  luck,  on  the  table. 

In  Guy  Mannering,  the  murder,  though  unpremeditated,  of 
a  single  person,  (himself  not  entirely  innocent,  but  at  least  by 
heartlessness  in  a  cruel  function  earning  his  fate,)  is  avenged 
to  the  uttermost  on  all  the  men  conscious  of  the  crime  ;  Mr. 
Bertram's  death,  like  that  of  his  wife,  brief  in  pain,  and  each 
told  in  the  space  of  half-a-dozen  lines  ;  and  that  of  the 
heroine  of  the  tale,  self-devoted,  heroic  in  the  highest,  and 
happy. 

Nor  is  it  ever  to  be  forgotten,  in  the  comparison  of  Scott's 
with  inferior  work,  that  his  own  splendid  powers  were,  even 
*n  early  life,  tainted,  and  in  his  latter  years  destroyed,  by 
modern  conditions  of  commercial  excitement,  then  first,  but 


FICTION— FAIR  AND  FOUL. 


161 


rapidly,  developing  themselves.  There  are  parts  even  in  his 
best  novels  coloured  to  meet  tastes  which  he  despised ;  and 
~uany  pages  written  in  his  later  ones  to  lengthen  his  article 
xor  the  indiscriminate  market. 

But  there  was  one  weakness  of  which  his  healthy  mind  re- 
mained incapable  to  the  last.  In  modern  stories  prepared  for 
more  refined  or  fastidious  audiences  than  those  of  Dickens, 
the  funereal  excitement  is  obtained,  for  the  most  part,  not  by 
the  infliction  of  violent  or  disgusting  death  ;  but  in  the  sus- 
pense, the  pathos,  and  the  more  or  less  by  all  felt,  and  recog- 
nised, mortal  phenomena  of  the  sick-room.  The  temptation, 
to  weak  writers,  of  this  order  of  subject  is  especially  great, 
because  the  study  of  it  from  the  living — or  dying — model  is 
so  easy,  and  to  many  has  been  the  most  impressive  part  of 
their  own  personal  experience  ;  while,  if  the  description  be 
given  even  with  mediocre  accuracy,  a  very  large  section  of 
readers  will  admire  its  truth,  and  cherish  its  melancholy. 
Few  authors  of  second  or  third  rate  genius  can  either  record 
or  invent  a  probable  conversation  in  ordinary  life  ;  but  few, 
on  the  other  hand,  are  so  destitute  of  observant  faculty  as  to 
be  unable  to  chronicle  the  broken  syllables  and  languid  move- 
ments of  an  invalid.  The  easily  rendered,  and  too  surely 
recognised,  image  of  familiar  suffering  is  felt  at  once  to  be 
real  where  all  else  had  been  false  ;  and  the  historian  of  the  gest- 
ures of  fever  and  words  of  delirium  can  count  on  the  applause 
of  a  gratified  audience  as  surely  as  the  dramatist  who  intro- 
duces on  the  stage  of  his  flagging  action  a  carriage  that  can 
be  driven  or  a  fountain  that  will  flow.  But  the  masters  of 
strong  imagination  disdain  such  work,  and  those  of  deep  sen- 
sibility shrink  from  it.1  Only  under  conditions  of  personal 
weakness,  presently  to  be  noted,  would  Scott  comply  with  the 
cravings  of  his  lower  audience  in  scenes  of  terror  like  the 
death  of  Front-de-Bceuf.    But  he  never  once  withdrew  the 

1  Nell,  in  the  Old  Curiosity  Shop,  was  simply  killed  for  the  market,  as 
a  butcher  kills  a  lamb  (see  Forster's  Life),  and  Paul  was  written  under 
the  same  conditions  of  illness  which  affected  Scott — a  part  of  the  omi- 
nous palsies,  grasping  alike  author  and  subject,  both  in  Dombey  and 
kittle  Dorrit. 


162 


FICTION— FAIR  AND  FOUL. 


sacred  curtain  of  the  sick-chamber,  nor  permitted  the  disgrace 
of  wanton  tears  round  the  humiliation  of  strength,  or  the 
wreck  of  beauty. 

IV.  No  exception  to  this  law  of  reverence  will  be  found  in 
the  scenes  in  Cceur  de  Lion's  illness  introductory  to  the  prin- 
cipal incident  in  the  Talisman.  An  inferior  writer  would 
have  made  the  king  charge  in  imagination  at  the  head  of  his 
chivalry,  or  wander  in  dreams  by  the  brooks  of  Aquitaine  ;  but 
Scott  allows  us  to  learn  no  more  startling  symptoms  of  the 
king's  malady  than  that  he  was  restless  and  impatient,  and 
could  not  wear  his  armour.  Nor  is  any  bodily  weakness,  or 
crisis  of  danger,  permitted  to  disturb  for  an  instant  the  royalty 
of  intelligence  and  heart  in  which  he  examines,  trusts  and 
obeys  the  physician  whom  his  attendants  fear. 

Yet  the  choice  of  the  main  subject  in  this  story  and  its 
companion — the  trial,  to  a  point  of  utter  torture,  of  knightly 
faith,  and  several  passages  in  the  conduct  of  both,  more  es- 
pecially the  exaggerated  scenes  in  the  House  of  Baldringham, 
and  hermitage  of  Engedi,  are  signs  of  the  gradual  decline  in 
force  of  intellect  and  soul  which  those  who  love  Scott  best 
have  done  him  the  worst  injustice  in  their  endeavours  to  dis- 
guise or  deny.  The  mean  anxieties,  moral  humiliations,  and 
mercilessly  demanded  brain-toil,  wrhich  killed  him,  show  their 
sepulchral  grasp  for  many  and  many  a  year  before  their  final 
victory  ;  and  the  states  of  more  or  less  dulled,  distorted,  and 
polluted  imagination  which  culminate  in  Castle  Dangerous, 
cast  a  Stygian  hue  over  St.  Bonan's  Well,  The  Fair  Maid  of 
Perth,  and  Anne  of  Geierstein,  which  lowers  them,  the  first 
altogether,  the  other  two  at  frequent  intervals,  into  fellowship 
with  the  normal  disease  which  festers  throughout  the  whole 
body  of  our  lower  fictitious  literature. 

Fictitious  !  I  use  the  ambiguous  word  deliberately  ;  for  it 
is  impossible  to  distinguish  in  these  tales  of  the  prison-house 
how  far  their  vice  and  gloom  are  thrown  into  their  manufact- 
ure only  to  meet  a  vile  demand,  and  how  far  they  are  an  in- 
tegral condition  of  thought  in  the  minds  of  men  trained 
from  their  youth  up  in  the  knowledge  of  Londinian  and  Pari 
sian  misery.    The  speciality  of  the  plague  is  a  delight  in  the 


FICTION— FAIR  AND  FOUL. 


163 


exposition  of  the  relations  between  guilt  and  decrepitude ; 
and  I  call  the  results  of  it  literature  '  of  the  prison-house,'  be- 
cause the  thwarted  habits  of  body  and  mind,  which  are  the 
jnmishment  of  reckless  crowding  in  cities,  become,  in  the 
issue  of  that  punishment,  frightful  subjects  of  exclusive  inter- 
est to  themselves  ;  and  the  art  of  fiction  in  which  they  finally 
delight  is  only  the  more  studied  arrangement  and  illustration, 
by  coloured  firelights,  of  the  daily  bulletins  of  their  own 
wretchedness,  in  the  prison  calendar,  the  police  news,  and 
the  hospital  report. 

The  reader  will  perhaps  be  surprised  at  my  separating  the 
greatest  work  of  Dickens,  Oliver  Twist,  with  honour,  from 
the  loathsome  mass  to  which  it  typically  belongs.  That  book 
is  an  earnest  and  uncaricatured  record  of  states  of  criminal 
life,  written  with  didactic  purpose,  full  of  the  gravest  instruc- 
tion, nor  destitute  of  pathetic  studies  of  noble  passion.  Even 
the  Mysteries  of  Paris  and  Gaboriau's  Crime  d'Augival  are 
raised,  by  their  definiteness  of  historical  intention  and  fore- 
warning anxiety,  far  above  the  level  of  their  order,  and  may 
be  accepted  as  photographic  evidence  of  an  otherwise  incredi- 
ble civilisation,  corrupted  in  the  infernal  fact  of  it,  down  to 
the  genesis  of  such  figures  as  the  Vicomte  d'Augival,  the 
Stabber,1  the  Skeleton,  and  the  She-wolf.  But  the  effectual 
head  of  the  whole  cretinous  school  is  the  renowned  novel  in 
which  the  hunchbacked  lover  watches  the  execution  of  his 

1  Chourineur  '  not  striking  with  dagger-point,  but  ripping  with  knife- 
edge.  Yet  I  do  him,  and  La  Louve,  injustice  in  classing  them  with  the 
two  others  ;  they  are  put  together  only  as  parts  in  the  same  phantasm. 
Compare  with  La  Louve,  the  strength  of  wild  virtue  in  the  '  Louve- 
cienne '  (Lucienne)  of  Gaboriau— she,  province-born  and  bred  ;  and  op- 
posed to  Parisian  civilisation  in  the  character  of  her  sempstress  friend. 
1  De  ce  Paris,  oil  elle  etait  nee,  elle  savait  tout— elle  connaissait  tout. 
Eien  ne  l'etonnait,  nul  ne  rintimidait.  Sa  science  des  details  materiels 
de  l'existence  etait  inconcevable.  Impossible  de  la  duper  ! — Eh  bien  ! 
cette  fille  si  laborieuse  et  si  econome  n'avait  meme  pas  la  plus  vague 
notion  des  sentiments  qui  sont  l'honneur  de  la  femme.  Je  n'avais  pas 
idee  d'une  si  complete  absence  de  sens  moral  ;  d  une  si  inconsciente 
depravation,  d'une  impudence  si  eftrontement  naive. ' — IJ Argent  des 
autre*,  vol.  i.  p.  358. 


164 


FICTION-FAIR  AND  FOUL. 


mistress  from  the  tower  of  Notre-Dame  ;  and  its  strength 
passes  gradually  away  into  the  anatomical  preparations,  for 
the  general  market,  of  novels  like  Poor  Miss  Finch,  in  which 
the  heroine  is  blind,  the  hero  epileptic,  and  the  obnoxious 
brother  is  found  dead  with  his  hands  dropped  off,  in  the  Arc- 
tic regions.1 

1  The  reader  who  cares  to  seek  it  may  easily  find  medical  evidence  of 
the  physical  effects  of  certain  states  of  brain  disease  in  producing  es- 
pecially images  of  truncated  and  Hermes-like  deformity,  complicated 
with  grossness.  Horace,  in  the  JSpodes,  scoffs  at  it,  but  not  without  hor- 
ror. Luca  Signorelli  and  Raphael  in  their  arabesques  are  deej>ly  struck 
by  it :  Durer,  defying  and  playing  with  it  alternately,  is  almost  beaten 
down  again  and  again  in  the  distorted  faces,  hewing  halberts,  and  sus- 
pended satyrs  of  his  arabesques  round  the  polyglot  Lord's  Prayer  ;  it 
takes  entire  possession  of  Balzac  in  the  Conies  Drolatiques  ;  it  struck 
Scott  in  the  earliest  days  of  his  childish  '  visions'  intensified  by  the  axe- 
stroke  murder  of  his  grand  aunt  ;  L.  i.  142,  and  see  close  of  this  note. 
It  chose  for  him  the  subject  of  the  Heart  of  Midlothian,  and  produced 
afterwards  all  the  recurrent  ideas  of  executions,  tainting  Nigel,  almost 
spoiling  Quentin  Durwarcl — utterly  the  Fair  Maid  of  Perth :  and  cul- 
minating in  Pizarro,  L.  x.  149.  It  suggested  all  the  deaths  by  falling, 
or  sinking,  as  in  delirious  sleep — Kennedy,  Eveline  Neville  (nearly 
repeated  in  Clara  Mowbray),  Amy  Robsart,  the  Master  of  Ravens  wood 
in  the  quicksand,  Morris,  and  Corporal  Grace-be-here — compare  the 
dream  of  Gride,  in  Nicholas  Nickleby,  and  Dickens's  own  last  words,  on 
the  ground,  (so  also,  in  my  own  inflammation  of  the  brain,  two  years 
ago,  I  dreamed  that  I  fell  through  the  earth  and  came  out  on  the  other 
side).  In  its  grotesque  and  distorting  power,  it  produced  all  the  figures 
of  the  Lay  Goblin,  Pacolet,  Flibbertigibbet,  Cockledemoy,  Geoffrey 
Hudson,  Fenella,  and  Nectabanus  ;  in  Dickens  it  in  like  manner  gives 
Quilp,  Krook,  Smike,  Smallweed,  Miss  Mowcher,  and  the  dwarfs  and 
Wax- work  of  Nell's  caravan  ;  and  runs  entirely  wild  in  Barnaby  Budge, 
where,  with  a  corps  de  drame  composed  of  one  idiot,  two  madmen,  a 
gentleman  fool  who  is  also  a  villain,  a  shop-boy  fool  who  is  also  a  black- 
guard, a  hangman,  a  shrivelled  virago,  and  a  doll  in  ribands — carrying 
this  company  through  riot  and  fire,  till  he  hangs  the  hangman,  one  of 
the  madmen,  his  mother,  and  the  idiot,  runs  the  gentleman-fool  through 
in  a  bloody  duel,  and  burns  and  crushes  the  shop-boy  fool  into  shape- 
lessness,  he  cannot  yet  be  content  without  shooting  the  spare  lover's  leg 
off,  and  marrying  him  to  the  doll  in  a  wooden  one  ;  the  shapeless  shop* 
boy  being  finally  also  married  in  hoo  wooden  ones.  It  is  this  mutilation, 
observe,  which  is  the  very  sign  manual  of  the  plague  ;  joined,  in  the 
artistic  forms  of  it,  with  a  love  of  thorniness — (in  their  mystic  root,  the 


FICTION— FAIR  AND  FOUL. 


165 


This  literature  of  the  Prison-house,  understanding  by  the 
word  not  only  the  cell  of  Newgate,  but  also  and  even  more  defi- 
nitely the  cell  of  the  Hotel-Dieu,  the  Hopital  des  Fous,  and 
the  grated  corridor  with  the  dripping  slabs  of  the  Morgue, 

truncation  of  the  limbless  serpent  and  the  spines  of  the  dragon's  wing. 
Compare  Modern  Painters,  vol.  iv. ,  'Chapter  on  the  Mountain  Gloom,' 
s.  19)  ;  and  in  all  forms  of  it,  with  petrifaction  or  loss  of  power  by  cold 
in  the  blood,  whence  the  last  Darwinian  process  of  the  witches'  charm 
— 1  cool  it  with  a  baboon's  blood,  then  the  charm  is  firm  and  good.'  The 
two  frescoes  in  the  colossal  handbills  which  have  lately  decorated  the 
streets  of  London  (the  baboon  with  the  mirror,  and  the  Maskelyne  and 
Cooke  decapitation)  are  the  final  English  forms  of  Raphael's  arabesque 
under  this  influence;  and  it  is  well  worth  while  to  get  the  number  for 
the  week  ending  April  8,  1880,  of  Young  Folks — 1 A  magazine  of  in- 
structive and  entertaining  literature  for  boys  and  girls  of  all  ages,'  con- 
taining '  A  Sequel  to  Desdichado  '  (the  modern  development  of  Ivanhoe), 
in  which  a  quite  monumental  example  of  the  kind  of  art  in  question 
will  be  found  as  a  leading  illustration  of  this  characteristic  sentence, 
11  See,  good  Cerberus,' '  said  Sir  Rupert,  "my  hand  has  been  struck  off. 
You  must  make  me  a  hand  of  iron,  one  icith  springs  in  it,  so  that  I  can 
make  it  grasp  a  dagger"  The  text  is  also,  as  it  professes  to  be,  instruc- 
tive ;  being  the  ultimate  degeneration  of  what  I  have  above  called  the 
4  folly  '  of  Ivanhoe  ;  for  folly  begets  folly  down,  and  down  ;  and  what- 
ever Scott  and  Turner  did  wrong  has  thousands  of  imitators — their 
wisdom  none  will  so  much  as  hear,  how  much  less  follow  ! 

In  both  of  the  Masters,  it  is  always  to  be  remembered  that  the  evil 
and  good  are  alike  conditions  of  literal  vision :  and  therefore  also,  in- 
separably connected  with  the  state  of  the  health.  I  believe  the  first 
elements  of  all  Scott's  errors  were  in  the  milk  of  his  consumptive  nurse, 
which  all  but  killed  him  as  an  infant,  L.  i.  19 — and  was  without  doubt 
the  cause  of  the  teething  fever  that  ended  in  his  lameness  (L.  i.  20). 
Then  came  (if  the  reader  cares  to  know  what  I  mean  by  Fors,  let  him 
read  the  page  carefully)  the  fearful  accidents  to  his  only  sister,  and  her 
death,  L.  i.  17;  then  the  madness  of  his  nurse,  who  planned  his  own 
murder  (21),  then  the  stories  continually  told  him  of  the  executions  at 
Carlisle  (24),  his  aunt's  husband  having  seen  them ;  issuing,  he  himself 
scarcely  knows  how,  in  the  unacountable  terror  that  came  upon  him  at 
the  sight  of  statuary,  31 — especially  Jacob's  ladder  ;  then  the  murder  of 
Mrs.  Swinton.  and  finally  the  nearly  fatal  bursting  of  the  bloodvessel  at 
Kelso,  with  the  succeeding  nervous  illness,  65-07 — solaced,  while  he 
was  being  4 bled  and  blistered  till  he  had  scarcely  a  pulse  left,'  by  that 
history  of  the  Knights  of  Malta— fondly  dwelt  on  and  realised  by  actual 
modelling  of  their  fortress,  which  returned  to  his  mind  for  the  theme 
of  its  last  effort  in  passing  away. 


106 


FICTION— FAIR  AND  FOUL. 


having  its  central  root  thus  in  the  He  de  Paris — or  historically 
and  pre-eminently  the  '  Cite  de  Paris  ' — is,  when  understood 
deeply,  the  precise  counter-corruption  of  the  religion  of  the 
Sainte  Chapelle,  just  as  the  worst  forms  of  bodily  and  mental 
ruin  are  the  corruption  of  love.  I  have  therefore  called  it 
'Fiction  mecroyante/  with  literal  accuracy,  and  precision; 
according  to  the  explanation  of  the  word  which  the  reader 
may  find  in  any  good  French  dictionary, 1  and  round  its  Arctic 
pole  in  the  Morgue,  he  may  gather  into  one  Caina  of  gelid 
putrescence  the  entire  product  of  modern  infidel  imagination, 
amusing  itself  with  destruction  of  the  body,  and  busying 
itself  with  aberration  of  the  mind. 

Aberration,  palsy,  or  plague,  observe,  as  distinguished  from 
normal  evil,  just  as  the  venom  of  rabies  or  cholera  differs 
from  that  of  a  wasp  or  a  viper.  The  life  of  the  insect  and 
serpent  deserves,  or  at  least  permits,  our  thoughts  ;  not  so 
the  stages  of  agony  in  the  fury-driven  hound.  There  is  some 
excuse,  indeed,  for  the  pathologic  labour  of  the  modern  nov- 
elist in  the  fact  that  he  cannot  easily,  in  a  city  population, 
find  a  healthy  mind  to  vivisect  :  but  the  greater  part  of  such 
amateur  surgery  is  the  struggle,  in  an  epoch  of  wild  literary 
competition,  to  obtain  novelty  of  material.  The  varieties  of 
asjoect  and  colour  in  healthy  fruit,  be  it  sweet  or  sour,  may 
be  within  certain  limits  described  exhaustively.  Not  so  the 
blotches  of  its  conceivable  blight :  and  while  the  symmetries 
of  integral  human  character  can  only  be  traced  by  harmonious 
and  tender  skill,  like  the  branches  of  a  living  tree,  the  faults 
and  gaps  of  one  gnawed  away  by  corroding  accident  can  be 
shuffled  into  senseless  change  like  the  wards  of  a  Chubb  lock. 

V.  It  is  needless  to  insist  on  the  vast  field  for  this  dice-cast 
or  card-dealt  calamity  which  opens  itself  in  the  ignorance, 
money-interest,  and  mean  passion,  of  city  marriage.  Peasants 
know  each  other  as  children — meet,  as  they  grow  up  in  test- 
ing labour ;  and  if  a  stout  farmers  son  marries  a  handless 
girl,  it  is  his  own  fault.  Also  in  the  patrician  families  of  the 
field,  the  young  people  know  what  they  are  doing,  and  marry 

1  *  Se  dit  par  denigrement,  dun  chretien  qui  ne  croit  pas  les  dogmes 
de  sa  religion.' — Fleming,  vol.  ii.  p.  659. 


FICTION— FAIR  AND  FOUL. 


a  neighbouring  estate,  or  a  covetable  title,  with  some  concep- 
tion of  the  responsibilities  they  undertake.  But  even  among 
these,  their  season  in  the  confused  metropolis  creates  licentious 
and  fortuitous  temptation  before  unknown  ;  and  in  the  lower 
middle  orders,  an  entirely  new  kingdom  of  discomfort  and 
disgrace  has  been  preached  to  them  in  the  doctrines  of  un- 
bridled pleasure  which  are  merely  an  apology  for  their  pecul- 
iar forms  of  illbreeding.  It  is  quite  curious  how  often  the 
catastrophe,  or  the  leading  interest,  of  a  modern  novel,  turns 
upon  the  want,  both  in  maid  and  bachelor,  of  the  common 
self-command  which  was  taught  to  their  grandmothers  and 
grandfathers  as  the  first  element  of  ordinarily  decent  behav- 
iour. Rashly  inquiring  the  other  day  the  plot  of  a  modern 
story  from  a  female  friend,  I  elicited,  after  some  hesitation, 
that  it  hinged  mainly  on  the  young  people's  6  forgetting  them- 
selves in  a  boat ; J  and  I  perceive  it  to  be  accepted  as  nearly 
an  axiom  in  the  code  of  modern  civic  chivalry  that  the  strength 
of  amiable  sentiment  is  proved  by  our  incapacity  on  proper 
occasions  to  express,  and  on  improper  ones  to  control  it.  The 
pride  of  a  gentleman  of  the  old  school  used  to  be  in  his  power 
of  saying  what  he  meant,  and  being  silent  when  he  ought, 
(not  to  speak  of  the  higher  nobleness  which  bestowed  love 
where  it  was  honourable,  and  reverence  where  it  was  due)  ; 
but  the  automatic  amours  and  involuntary  proposals  of  recent 
romance  acknowledge  little  further  law  of  morality  than  the 
instinct  of  an  insect,  or  the  effervescence  of  a  chemical  mixt- 
ure. 

There  is  a  pretty  little  story  of  Alfred  de  Musset's,— La 
Mouche,  which,  if  the  reader  cares  to  glance  at  it,  will  save 
me  further  trouble  in  explaining  the  disciplinarian  authority 
of  mere  old-fashioned  politeness,  as  in  some  sort  protective  of 
higher  things.  It  describes,-  with  much  grace  and  precision, 
a  state  of  society  by  no  means  pre-eminently  virtuous,  or  en- 
thusiastically heroic  ;  in  which  many  people  do  extremely 
wrong,  and  none  sublimely  right.  But  as  there  are  heights 
of  which  the  achievement  is  unattempted,  there  are  abysses 
to  which  fall  is  barred  ;  neither  accident  nor  temptation  will 
make  any  of  the  principal  personages  swerve  from  an  adopted 


108 


FICTION— FAIR  ANh  FOUL. 


resolution,  or  violate  an  accepted  principle  of  honour  ;  people 
are  expected  as  a  matter  of  course  to  speak  with  propriety  on 
occasion,  and  to  wait  with  patience  when  they  are  bid  :  those 
who  do  wrong,  admit  it  ;  those  who  do  right  don't  boast  of 
it ;  everybody  knows  his  own  mind,  and  everybody  has  good 
manners. 

Nor  must  it  be  forgotten  that  in  the  worst  days  of  the  self- 
indulgence  which  destroyed  the  aristocracies  of  Europe,  their 
vices,  however  licentious,  were  never,  in  the  fatal  modern 
sense,  'unprincipled.'  The  vainest  believed  in  virtue;  the 
vilest  respected  it.  '  Chaque  chose  avait  son  nom,' J  and  the 
severest  of  English  moralists  recognises  the  accurate  wit,  the 
lofty  intellect,  and  the  unfretted  benevolence,  which  redeemed 
from  vitiated  surroundings  the  circle  of  d'Alembert  and  Har- 
mon tel. 2 

I  have  said,  with  too  slight  praise,  that  the  vainest,  in  those 
days,  '  believed  '  in  virtue.  Beautiful  and  heroic  examples  of 
it  were  always  before  them  ;  nor  was  it  without  the  secret  sig- 
nificance attaching  to  what  may  seem  the  least  accidents  in 
the  work  of  a  master,  that  Scott  gave  to  both  his  heroines  of 
the  age  of  revolution  in  England  the  name  of  the  queen  of  the 
highest  order  of  English  chivalry.3 

It  is  to  say  little  for  the  types  of  youth  and  maid  which 
alone  Scott  felt  it  a  joy  to  imagine,  or  thought  it  honourable 
to  portray,  that  they  act  and  feel  in  a  sphere  where  they  are 
never  for  an  instant  liable  to  any  of  the  weaknesses  which 
disturb  the  calm,  or  shake  the  resolution,  of  chastity  and 
courage  in  a  modern  novel.  Scott  lived  in  a  country  and  time, 

1  1  A  son  nom,'  properly.  The  sentence  is  one  o£  Victor  Cherbuliez's, 
in  Prosper  Randoce,  which  is  full  of  other  valuable  ones.  See  the  old 
nurse's  4  ici  has  les  choses  vont  de  travers,  comme  un  chien  qui  va  a 
vepres,  p.  93  ;  and  compare  Prosper's  treasures,  '  la  petite  Venus,  et  ie 
petit  Christ  d'ivoire,'  p.  121  ;  also  Madame  Brehanne's  request  for  the 
divertissement  of  1  quelque  belle  batterie  a  coups  de  couteau  '  with  Did- 
ier's  answer.  *  Helas !  madame,  vous  jouez  de  malheur,  ici  dans  la 
Drome,  Ton  se  massacre  aussi  peu  que  possible,'  p.  33. 

2Edgeworth's  Tales  (Hunter,  1827),  *  Harrington  and  Ormond,' vol. 
iii.  p.  260. 

a  Alice  of  Salisbury,  Alice  Lee,  Alice  Bridgnorth. 


FICTION— FAIR  AND  FOUL. 


169 


when,  from  highest  to  lowest,  but  chiefly  in  that  dignified  and 
nobly  severe  1  middle  class  to  which  he  himself  belonged,  a 
habit  of  serene  and  stainless  thought  was  as  natural  to  the  peo- 
ple as  their  mountain  air.  Women  like  Rose  Bradwardine  and 
Ailie  Dinmont  were  the  grace  and  guard  of  almost  every  house- 
hold (God  be  praised  that  the  race  of  them  is  not  yet  extinct, 
for  all  that  Mall  or  Boulevard  can  do),  and  it  has  perhaps  es- 
caped the  notice  of  even  attentive  readers  that  the  compara- 
tively uninteresting  character  of  Sir  Walter's  heroes  had  always 
been  studied  among  a  class  of  youths  who  were  simply  inca- 
pable of  doing  anything  seriously  wrong  ;  and  could  only  be 
embarrassed  by  the  consequences  of  their  levity  or  impru- 
dence. 

But  there  is  another  difference  in  the  woof  of  a  Waverley 
novel  from  the  cobweb  of  a  modern  one,  which  depends  on 
Scott's  larger  view  of  human  life.  Marriage  is  by  no  means, 
in  his  conception  of  man  and  woman,  the  most  important  busi- 
ness of  their  existence  ; 2  nor  love  the  only  reward  to  be  pro- 
posed to  their  virtue  or  exertion.  It  is  not  in  his  reading  of 
the  laws  of  Providence  a  necessity  that  virtue  should,  either 
by  love  or  any  other  external  blessing,  he  rewarded  at  all ; 3 
and  marriage  is  in  all  cases  thought  of  as  a  constituent  of  the 
happiness  of  life,  but  not  as  its  only  interest,  still  less  its  only 
aim.  And  upon  analysing  with  some  care  the  motives  of  his 
principal  stories,  we  shall  often  find  that  the  love  in  them  is 
merely  a  light  by  which  the  sterner  features  of  character  are 
to  be  irradiated,  and  that  the  marriage  of  the  hero  is  as  sub- 
ordinate to  the  main  bent  of  the  story  as  Henry  the  Fifth's 

1  Scott's  father  was  habitually  ascetic.  '  I  have  heard  his  son  tell  that 
it  was  common  with  him,  if  any  one  observed  that  the  soup  was  good, 
to  taste  it  again,  and  say,  "Yes— it  is  too  good,  bairns,"  and  dash  a 
tumbler  of  cold  water  into  his  plate. ' — Lockhart  s  Life  (Black,  Edin- 
burgh, 1869),  vol.  i.  p.  312.  In  other  places  I  refer  to  this  book  in  the 
simple  form  of  *  L. ' 

2  A  young  lady  sang  to  me,  just  before  I  copied  out  this  page  for  press, 
a  Miss  Somebody's  4  great  song,'  'Live,  and  Love,  and  Die.'  Had  it 
been  written  for  nothing  better  than  silkworms,  it  should  at  least  have 
added — Spin. 

3  See  passage  of  introduction  to  Ivanhoe,  wisely  quoted  in  L,  vi  106. 


170 


FICTION— FAIR  AND  FOUL. 


courtship  of  Katherine  is  to  the  battle  of  Agincourt.  Nay,  the 
fortunes  of  the  person  who  is  nominally  the  subject  of  the  tale 
are  often  little  more  than  a  background  on  which  grander 
figures  are  to  be  drawn,  and  deeper  fates  forth-shadowed.  The 
judgments  between  the  faith  and  chivalry  of  Scotland  at  Drum- 
clog  and  Bothwell  bridge  owe  little  of  their  interest  in  the 
mind  of  a  sensible  reader  to  the  fact  that  the  captain  of  the 
Popinjay  is  carried  a  prisoner  to  one  battle,  and  returns  a 
prisoner  from  the  other :  and  Scott  himself,  while  he  watches 
the  white  sail  that  bears  Queen  Mary  for  the  last  time  from 
her  native  land,  very  nearly  forgets  to  finish  his  novel,  or  to 
tell  us — and  with  small  sense  of  any  consolation  to  be  had  out 
of  that  minor  circumstance, — that  '  Eoland  and  Catherine  were 
united,  spite  of  their  differing  faiths.' 

Neither  let  it  be  thought  for  an  instant  that  the  slight,  and 
sometimes  scornful,  glance  with  which  Scott  passes  over  scenes 
Which  a  novelist  of  our  own  day  would  have  analysed  with  the 
airs  of  a  philosopher,  and  painted  with  the  curiosity  of  a  gos- 
sip, indicate  any  absence  in  his  heart  of  sympathy  with  the 
great  and  sacred  elements  of  personal  happiness.  An  era  like 
ours,  which  has  with  diligence  and  ostentation  swept  its  heart 
clear  of  all  the  passions  once  known  as  loyalty,  patriotism,  and 
piety,  necessarily  magnifies  the  apparent  force  of  the  one  re- 
maining sentiment  which  sighs  through  the  barren  chambers, 
or  clings  inextricably  round  the  chasms  of  ruin  ;  nor  can  it 
but  regard  with  awe  the  unconquerable  spirit  which  still 
tempts  or  betrays  the  sagacities  of  selfishness  into  error  or 
frenzy  which  is  believed  to  be  love. 

That  Scott  was  never  himself,  in  the  sense  of  the  phrase  as 
employed  by  lovers  of  the  Parisian  school,  £ivre  d'amour,' 
may  be  admitted  without  prejudice  to  his  sensibility, 1  and  that 
he  never  knew  -  l'amor  che  move  '1  sol  e  l'altre  stelle/  was  the 
chief,  though  unrecognised,  calamity  of  his  deeply  chequered 
life.  But  the  reader  of  honour  and  feeling  will  not  therefore 
suppose  that  the  love  which  Miss  Vernon  sacrifices,  stooping 
for  an  instant  from  her  horse,  is  of  less  noble  stamp,  or  less 

1  See  below,  note,  p.  25,  on  the  conclusion  of  Woodstock. 


FICTION— FAIR  AND  FOUL. 


171 


enduring  faith,  than  that  which  troubles  and  degrades  the 
whole  existence  of  Consuelo  ;  or  that  the  affection  of  Jeanie 
Deans  for  the  companion  of  her  childhood,  drawn  like  a  field 
of  soft  blue  heaven  beyond  the  cloudy  wrack  of  her  sorrow, 
is  less  fully  in  possession  of  her  soul  than  the  hesitating  and 
self-reproachful  impulses  under  which  a  modern  heroine  for- 
gets herself  in  a  boat,  or  compromises  herself  in  the  cool  of 
the  evening. 

I  do  not  wish  to  return  over  the  waste  ground  we  have  trav- 
ersed, comparing,  point  by  point,  Scott's  manner  with  those 
of  Bermondsey  and  the  Faubourgs ;  but  it  may  be,  perhaps, 
interesting  at  this  moment  to  examine,  with  illustration  from 
those  Waver! ey  novels  which  have  so  lately  retracted  the  atten- 
tion of  a  fair  and  gentle  public,  the  universal  conditions  of 
'  style/  rightly  so  called,  which  are  in  all  ages,  and  above  all 
local  currents  or  wTavering  tides  of  temporary  manners,  pil- 
lars of  what  is  for  ever  strong,  and  models  of  what  is  for  ever 
fair. 

But  I  must  first  define,  and  that  within  strict  horizon,  the 
works  of  Scott,  in  wThich  his  perfect  mind  may  be  known,  and 
his  chosen  ways  understood. 

His  great  works  of  prose  fiction,  excepting  only  the  first 
half -volume  of  Wauerley,  were  all  wTritten  in  twelve  years, 
1814-26  (of  his  own  age  forty-three  to  fifty-five),  the  actual 
time  employed  in  their  composition  being  not  more  than  a 
couple  of  months  out  of  each  year  ;  and  during  that  time  only 
iihe  morning  hours  and  spare  minutes  during  the  professional 
day.  '  Though  the  first  volume  of  Waverley  was  begun  long 
ago,  and  actually  lost  for  a  time,  yet  the  other  two  were  begun 
and  finished  between  the  4th  of  June  and  the  first  of  July, 
during  all  which  I  attended  my  duty  in  court,  and  proceeded 
without  loss  of  time  or  hindrance  of  business.' 1 

Few  of  the  maxims  for  the  enforcement  of  which,  in  Mod- 
ern Painters,  long  ago,  I  got  the  general  character  of  a  lover 
of  paradox,  are  more  singular,  or  more  sure,  than  the  state- 
ment, apparently  so  encouraging  to  the  idle,  that  if  a  great 


i  L.  iv.  177. 


172 


FICTION— FAIR  AND  FOUL. 


thing  can  be  done  at  all,  it  can  be  done  easily.  But  it  is  in 
that  kind  of  ease  with  which  a  tree  blossoms  after  long  years 
of  gathered  strength,  and  all  Scott's  great  writings  were  the 
recreations  of  a  mind  confirmed  in  dutiful  labour,  and  rich 
with  organic  gathering  of  boundless  resource. 

Omitting  from  our  count  the  two  minor  and  ill-finished 
sketches  of  the  Black  Dwarf  and  Legend  of  Montrose,  and,  for 
a  reason  presently  to  be  noticed,  the  unhappy  St.  Bonan's,  the 
memorable  romances  of  Scott  are  eighteen,  falling  into  three 
distinct  groups,  containing  six  each. 

The  first  group  is  distinguished  from  the  other  two  by 
characters  of  strength  and  felicity  which  never  more  appeared 
after  Scott  was  struck  down  by  his  terrific  illness  in  1819. 
It  includes  Waverley,  Guy  Mannering,  The  Antiquary,  Bob  Boy , 
Old  Mortality,  and  The  Heart  of  Midlothian. 

The  composition  of  these  occupied  the  mornings  of  his 
happiest  days,  between  the  ages  of  43  and  48.  On  the  8th  of 
April,  1819  (he  was  48  on  the  preceding  15th  of  August)  he 
began  for  the  first  time  to  dictate — being  unable  for  the  ex- 
ertion of  writing — The  Bride  of  Lammermuir,  ■  the  affection- 
ate Laidlaw  beseeching  him  to  stop  dictating,  when  his  audi- 
ble suffering  filled  every  pause.  "Nay,  Willie,"  he  answered 
"  only  see  that  the  doors  are  fast.  I  would  fain  keep  all  the 
cry  as  well  as  all  the  wool  to  ourselves  ;  but  as  for  giving 
over  work,  that  can  only  be  when  I  am  in  woollen." ' 1  From 
this  time  forward  the  brightness  of  joy  and  sincerity  of  in- 
evitable humour,  which  perfected  the  imagery  of  the  earlier 
novels,  are  wholly  absent,  except  in  the  two  short  intervals  of 
health  unaccountably  restored,  in  which  he  wrote  Bedgauntlet 
and  Nigel. 

It  is  strange,  but  only  a  part  of  the  general  simplicity  of 
Scott's  genius,  that  these  revivals  of  earlier  power  were  un- 
conscious, and  that  the  time  of  extreme  weakness  in  which  he 
wrote  St.  Bonans  Well,  was  that  in  which  he  first  asserted  his 
own  restoration. 

It  is  also  a  deeply  interesting  characteristic  of  his  noble 
nature  that  he  never  gains  anything  by  sickness  ;  the  whole 

1  L.  vi.  67. 


FICTION— FAIR  AND  FOUL. 


173 


man  breathes  or  faints  as  one  creature  ;  the  ache  that  stiffens 
a  limb  chills  his  heart,  and  every  pang  of  the  stomach 
paralyses  the  brain.  It  is  not  so  with  inferior  minds,  in  the 
workings  of  which  it  is  often  impossible  to  distinguish  native 
from  narcotic  fancy,  and  throbs  of  conscience  from  those  of 
indigestion.  Whether  in  exaltation  or  languor,  the  colours  of 
mind  are  always  morbid,  which  gleam  on  the  sea  for  the 
'  Ancient  Mariner/  and  through  the  casements  on  '  St.  Agnes' 
Eve  ; '  but  Scott  is  at  once  blinded  and  stultified  by  sickness  ; 
never  has  a  fit  of  the  cramp  without  spoiling  a  chapter,  and  ia 
perhaps  the  only  author  of  vivid  imagination  who  never  wrote 
a  foolish  word  but  when  he  was  ill. 

It  remains  only  to  be  noticed  on  this  point  that  any 
strong  natural  excitement,  affecting  the  deeper  springs  of  his 
heart,  would  at  once  restore  his  intellectual  powers  in  all 
their  fullness,  and  that,  far  towards  their  sunset :  but  that 
the  strong  will  on  which  he  prided  himself,  though  it  could 
trample  upon  pain,  silence  grief,  and  compel  industry,  never 
could  warm  his  imagination,  or  clear  the  judgment  in  his 
darker  hours. 

I  believe  that  this  power  of  the  heart  over  the  intellect  is 
common  to  all  great  men  :  but  what  the  special  character  of 
emotion  was,  that  alone  could  lift  Scott  above  the  power  of 
death,  I  am  about  to  ask  the  reader,  in  a  little  while,  to  ob- 
serve with  joyful  care. 

The  first  series  of  romances  then,  above  named,  are  all  that 
exhibit  the  emphasis  of  his  unharmed  faculties.  The  second 
group,  composed  in  the  three  years  subsequent  to  illness  ail 
but  mortal,  bear  every  one  of  them  more  or  less  the  seal  of  it 

They  consist  of  the  Bride  of  Lammermuir,  Ivanhoe,  the 
Monastery,  the  Abbot,  Kenilworth,  and  the  Pirate.1  The  marks 
of  broken  health  on  all  these  are  essentially  twofold — pre- 
vailing melancholy,  and  fantastic  improbability.  Three  of 
the  tales  are  agonizingly  tragic,  the  Abbot  scarcely  less  so  in 
its  main  event,  and  Ivanhoe  deeply  wounded  through  all  its 

I I  One  other  such  novel,  and  there's  an  end  ;  but-  who  can  last  for 
ever  ?  who  ever  lasted  so  long  V  ' — Sydney  Smith  (of  the  Pirate)  tc 
Jeffrey,  December  30,  1821.    (Letters*  vol.  ii.  x>.  223.) 


174 


FICTION— FAIR  AND  FOUL. 


bright  panoply  ;  while  even  in  that  most  powerful  of  the 
series,  the  impossible  archeries  and  axestrokes,  the  incredibly 
opportune  appearances  of  Locksley,  the  death  of  Ulrica,  and 
the  resuscitation  of  Athelstane,  are  partly  boyish,  partly  fever- 
ish. Caleb  in  the  Bride,  Triptolemus  and  Halcro  in  the 
Pirate,  are  all  laborious,  and  the  first  incongruous  ;  half  a 
volume  of  the  Abbot  is  spent  in  extremely  dull  detail  of  Ro- 
land's relations  with  his  fellow-servants  and  his  mistress, 
which  have  nothing  whatever  to  do  with  the  future  story  ; 
and  the  lady  of  Avenel  herself  disappears  after  the  first 
volume,  'like  a  snaw  wreath  when  it's  thaw,  Jeanie.'  The 
public  has  for  itself  pronounced  on  the  Monastery,  though  as 
much  too  harshly  as  it  has  foolishly  praised  the  horrors  of 
Bavenswood  and  the  nonsense  of  Ivanhoe  ;  because  the  modern 
public  finds  in  the  torture  and  adventure  of  these,  the  kind 
of  excitement  which  it  seeks  at  an  opera,  while  it  has  no 
sympathy  whatever  with  the  pastoral  happiness  of  Glendearg, 
or  with  the  lingering  simplicities  of  superstition  which  give 
historical  likelihood  to  the  legend  of  the  White  Lady. 

But  both  this  despised  tale  and  its  sequel  have  Scott's 
heart  in  them.  The  first  was  begun  to  refresh  himself  in  the 
intervals  of  artificial  labour  on  Imnhoe.  c  It  was  a  relief,'  he 
said,  '  to  interlay  the  scenery  most  iamiliar  to  me  1  with  the 
strange  world  for  which  I  had  to  draw  so  much  on  imagi- 
nation.' 3    Through  all  the  closing  scenes  of  the  second  he  is 

1  L.  vi.  p.  188.    Compare  the  description  of  Fairy  Dean,  vii.  192. 

2  All,  alas  !  were  now  in  a  great  measure  so  written.  Ivanhoe,  The 
Monastery,  The  Abbot  and  Kenilworth  were  all  published  between  De- 
cember 1819  and  January  1821,  Constable  &  Co.  giving  five  thousand 
guineas  for  the  remaining  copyright  of  them,  Scott  clearing  ten  thou- 
sand before  the  bargain  was  completed  ;  and  before  the  Fortunes  oj 
Nigel  issued  from  the  press  Scott  had  exchanged  instruments  and  re- 
ceived his  bookseller's  bills  for  no  less  than  four  '  works  of  fiction,'  not 
one  of  them  otherwise  described  in  the  deeds  of  agreement,  to  be  pro- 
duced in  unbroken  succession,  each  of  them  to  Ml  up  at  least  three  volumes^ 
but  with  proper  saving  clauses  as  to  increase  of  copy  money  in  case  any  of 
them  should  run  to  four  ;  and  within  two  years  all  this  anticipation  had 
Veen  wiped  off  by  Peveril  of  the  Pcak>  QuerUin  Durward}  St.  Ronaris 
We'd,  and  Reel  gauntlet 


FICTION— FAIR  AND  FOUL. 


175 


raised  to  his  own  true  level  by  bis  love  for  the  queen.  And 
within  the  code  of  Scott's  work  to  which  I  am  about  to  appeal 
for  illustration  of  his  essential  powers,  I  accept  the  Monastery 
and  Abbot,  and  reject  from  it  the  remaining  four  of  this  group. 

The  last  series  contains  two  quite  noble  ones,  Redgauntlet 
and  Nigel ;  two  of  very  high  value,  Durward  and  Woodstock  ; 
the  slovenly  and  diffuse  Fever it,  written  for  the  trade  ;  the 
sickly  Tales  of  the  Crusaders,  and  the  entirely  broken  and  dis- 
eased St.  Romans  Well.  This  last  I  throw  out  of  count  alto- 
gether, and  of  the  rest,  accept  only  the  four  first  named  as 
sound  work  ;  so  that  the  list  of  the  novels  in  which  I  propose 
to  examine  his  methods  and  ideal  standards,  reduces  itself  to 
these  following  twelve  (named  in  order  of  production)  : 
Waverley,  Guy  Mannering,  the  Antiquary,  Rob  Roy,  Old  Mor- 
tality, the  Heart  of  Midlothian,  the  Monastery,  the  Abbot,  the 
Fortunes  of  Nigel,  Quentin  Durward,  and  Woodstock. 1 

It  is,  however,  too  late  to  enter  on  my  subject  in  this  arti- 
cle, which  I  may  fitly  close  by  pointing  out  some  of  the  merely 
verbal  characteristics  of  his  style,  illustrative  in  little  ways  of 
the  questions  we  have  been  examining,  and  chiefly  of  the  one 
which  may  be  most  embarrassing  to  many  readers,  the  differ- 
ence, namely,  between  character  and  disease. 

One  quite  distinctive  charm  in  the  Waverleys  is  their  modi- 
fied use  of  the  Scottish  dialect ;  but  it  has  not  generally  been 
observed,  either  by  their  imitators,  or  the  authors  of  different 
taste  who  have  written  for  a  later  public,  that  there  is  a  differ- 
ence between  the  dialect  of  a  language,  and  its  corruption. 

A  dialect  is  formed  in  any  district  where  there  are  persons 
of  intelligence  enough  to  use  the  language  itself  in  all  its  fine- 
ness and  force,  but  under  the  particular  conditions  of  life, 
climate,  and  temper,  which  introduce  words  peculiar  to  the 
scenery,  forms  of  word  and  idioms  of  sentence  peculiar  to  the 
race,  and  pronunciations  indicative  of  their  character  and  dis- 
position. 

1  Woodstock  was  finished  26th  March  1826.  He  knew  then  of  his 
ruin  ;  and  wrote  in  bitterness,  but  not  in  weakness.  The  closing  pages 
are  the  most  beautiful  of  the  book,  But  a  month  afterwards  Lady  Scott 
died  ;  and  he  never  wrote  glad  word  more. 


176 


FICTION— FAIR  AND  FOUL. 


Thus  '  burn '  (of  a  streamlet)  is  a  word  possible  only  in  a 
country  where  there  are  brightly  running  waters,  'lassie,'  a 
word  possible  dnly  where  girls  are  as  free  as  the  rivulets,  and 
*  auld,'  a  form  of  the  southern  '  old,'  adopted  by  a  race  of 
finer  musical  ear  than  the  English. 

On  the  contrary,  mere  deteriorations,  or  coarse,  stridulent, 
and,  in  the  ordinary  sense  of  the  phrase,  '  broad '  forms  of 
utterance,  are  not  dialects  at  all,  having  nothing  dialectic  in 
them,  and  all  phrases  developed  in  states  of  rude  employment, 
and  restricted  intercourse,  are  injurious  to  the  tone  and  nar- 
rowing to  the  power  of  the  language  they  affect.  Mere 
breadth  of  accent  does  not  spoil  a  dialect  as  long  as  the  speak- 
ers are  men  of  varied  idea  and  good  intelligence  ;  but  the  mo- 
ment the  life  is  contracted  by  mining,  mill  work,  or  any  op- 
pressive and  monotonous  labour,  the  accents  and  phrases  be- 
come debased.  It  is  part  of  the  popular  folly  of  the  day  to 
find  pleasure  in  trying  to  write  and  spell  these  abortive,  crip- 
pled, and  more  or  less  brutal  forms  of  human  speech. 

Abortive,  crippled,  or  brutal,  are  however  not  necessarily 
'  corrupted '  dialects.  Corrupt  language  is  that  gathered  by 
ignorance,  invented  by  vice,  misused  by  insensibility,  or 
minced  and  mouthed  by  affectation,  especially  in  the  attempt 
to  deal  with  words  of  which  only  half  the  meaning  is  under- 
stood, or  half  the  sound  heard.  Mrs.  Gamp's  e  aperiently  so  ' 
— and  the  '  undermined  '  with  primal  sense  of  undermine,  of 
— I  forget  which  gossip,  in  the  Mill  on  the  Floss,  are  master- 
and  mistress  pieces  in  this  latter  kind.  Mrs.  Malaprop's  'al- 
legories on  the  banks  of  the  Nile  9  are  in  a  somewhat  higher 
order  of  mistake  :  Miss  Tabitha  Bramble's  ignorance  is  vul- 
garised by  her  selfishness,  and  Winifred  Jenkins'  by  her  con- 
•  ceit.  The  '  wot '  of  Noah  Claypole,  and  the  other  degradations 
of  cockneyism  (Sam  Weller  and  his  father  are  in  nothing  more 
admirable  than  in  the  power  of  heart  and  sense  that  can 
purify  even  these)  ;  the  'trewth'  of  Mr.  Chadband,  and 
6  natur '  of  Mr.  Squeers,  are  examples  of  the  corruption  of 
words  by  insensibility  :  the  use  of  the  word  'bloody'  in  mod- 
ern low  English  is  a  deeper  corruption,  not  altering  the  form 
of  the  word,  but  defiling  the  thought  in  it. 


FICTION— FAIR  AND  FOUL. 


177 


Thus  much  being  understood,  I  shall  proceed  to  examine 
thoroughly  a  fragment  of  Scott's  Lowland  Scottish  dialect ; 
not  choosing  it  of  the  most  beautiful  kind  ;  on  the  contrary, 
it  shall  be  a  piece  reaching  as  low  down  as  he  ever  allows 
Scotch  to  go — it  is  perhaps  the  only  unfair  patriotism  in  him, 
that  if  ever  he  wants  a  word  or  two  of  really  villanous  slang, 
he  gives  it  in  English  or  Dutch — not  Scotch. 

I  had  intended  in  the  close  of  this  paper  to  analyse  and  com- 
pare the  characters  of  Andrew  Fair  service  and  Richie  Moni- 
plies  for  examples,  the  former  of  innate  evil,  unaffected  by  ex- 
ternal influences,  and  undiseased,  but  distinct  from  natural 
goodness  as  a  nettle  is  distinct  from  balm  or  lavender  ;  and 
the  latter  of  innate  goodness,  contracted  and  pinched  by  cir- 
cumstance, but  still  undiseased,  as  an  oak-leaf  crisped  by  frost, 
not  by  the  worm.  This,  with  much  else  in  my  mind,  I  must 
put  off ;  but  the  careful  study  of  one  sentence  of  Andrew's 
will  give  us  a  good  deal  to  think  of. 

I  take  his  account  of  the  rescue  of  Glasgow'  Cathedral  at  the 
time  of  the  Reformation. 

Ah  !  it's  a  brave  kirk — nane  o'  yere  whigmaleeries  and 
curliewurlies  and  opensteek  hems  about  it — a'  solid,  weel- 
jointed  mason-wark,  that  will  stand  as  lang  as  the  warld,  keep 
hands  and  gunpowther  aff  it.  It  had  amaist  a  douncome  lang 
syne  at  the  Reformation,  when  they  pu'd  doun  the  kirks  of 
St.  Andrews  and  Perth,  and  thereawa',  to  cleanse  them  o'  Pap- 
ery, and  idolatry,  and  image-worship,  and  surplices,  and  sic- 
like  rags  o'  the  muckle  hure  that  sitteth  on  seven  hills,  as  if 
ane  wasna  braid  eneugh  for  her  auld  hinder  end.  Sae  the 
commons  o'  Renfrew,  and  o'  the  Barony,  and  the  Gorbals,  and 
a'  about,  they  behoved  to  come  into  Glasgow  ae  fair  morning, 
to  try  their  hand  on  purging  the  High  Kirk  o'  Popish  nick- 
nackets.  But  the  townsmen  o'  Glasgow,  they  were  feared 
their  auld  edifice  might  slip  the  girths  in  gaun  through  siccan 
rough  physic,  sae  they  rang  the  common  bell,  and  assembled 
the  train-bands  wi'  took  o'  drum.  By  good  luck,  the  worthy 
James  Rabat  was  Dean  o'  Guild  that  year — (and  a  gude  ma- 
son he  was  himsell,  made  him  the  keener  to  keep  up  the  auld 
bigging),  and  the  trades  assembled,  and  offered  downright 
battle  to  the  commons,  rather  than  their  kirk  should  coup  the 
crans,  as  others  had  done  elsewhere,    Ic  wasna  for  luve  o" 


178 


FICTION— FAIR  AND  FOUL. 


Paperie — na,  na ! — nane  could  ever  say  that  o'  the  trades  o' 
Glasgow — Sae  they  sune  came  to  an  agreement  to  take  a'  the 
idolatrous  statues  of  sants  (sorrow  be  on  them  !)  out  o'  their 
neuks — And  sae  the  bits  o'  stane  idols  were  broken  in  pieces 
by  Scripture  warrant,  and  flung  into  the  Molenclinar  burn,  and 
the  auld  kirk  stood  as  crouse  as  a  cat  when  the  flaesare  kaimed 
aff  her,  and  a'body  was  alike  pleased.  And  I  hae  heard  wise 
folk  say,  that  if  the  same  had  been  done  in  ilka  kirk  in  Scot- 
land, the  Reform  wad  just  hae  been  as  pure  as  it  is  e'en  now, 
and  we  wad  hae  mair  Christian -like  kirks  ;  for  I  hae  been  sae 
lang  in  England,  that  nae thing  will  drived  out  o'  my  head, 
that  the  dog-kennel  at  Osbaldistone-Hall  is  better  than  mony 
a  house  o'  God  in  Scotland. 

Now  this  sentence  is  in  the  first  place  a  piece  of  Scottish 
history  of  quite  inestimable  and  concentrated  value.  Andrew's 
temperament  is  the  type  of  a  vast  class  of  Scottish — shall  we 
call  it  ■  soio-thistlian ' — mind,  which  necessarily  takes  the  view 
of  either  Pope  or  saint  that  the  thistle  in  Lebanon  took  of  the 
cedar  or  lilies  in  Lebanon  ;  and  the  entire  force  of  the  pas- 
sions which,  in  the  Scottish  revolution,  foretold  and  forearmed 
the  French  one,  is  told  in  this  one  paragraph  ;  the  coarseness 
of  it,  observe,  being  admitted,  not  for  the  sake  of  the  laugh, 
any  more  than  an  onion  in  broth  merely  for  its  flavour,  but 
for  the  meat  of  it  ;  the  inherent  constancy  of  that  coarseness 
being  a  fact  in  this  order  of  mind,  and  an  essential  part  of  the 
history  to  be  told. 

Secondly,  observe  that  this  speech,  in  the  religious  passion 
of  it,  such  as  there  may  be,  is  entirely  sincere.  Andrew  is  a 
thief,  a  liar,  a  coward,  and,  in  the  Fair  service  from  which  he 
takes  his  name,  a  hypocrite  ;  but  in  the  form  of  prejudice, 
which  is  all  that  his  mind  is  capable  of  in  the  place  of  religion, 
he  is  entirely  sincere.  He  does  not  in  the  least  pretend  detes- 
tation of  image  worship  to  please  his  master,  or  any  one  else ; 
he  honestly  scorns  the  *  carnal  morality  1  as  dowd  and  fusion- 
less  as  rue-leaves  at  Yule  '  of  the  sermon  in  the  upper  cathe- 
dral ;  and  when  wrapt  in  critical  attention  to  the  *  real  savour 
o'  doctrine'  in  the  crypt,  so  completely  forgets  the  hypocrisy  of 

1  Compare  Mr.  Spurgeon's  not  unfrequent  orations  on  the  same  sub- 
ject. 


FICTION— PAIR  AND  FOUL. 


179 


his  fair  service  as  to  return  his  master's  attempt  to  disturb 
him  with  hard  punches  of  the  elbow. 

Thirdly.  He  is  a  man  of  no  mean  sagacity,  quite  up  to  the 
average  standard  of  Scottish  common  sense,  not  a  low  one  ; 
and,  though  incapable  of  understanding  any  manner  of  lofty 
thought  or  passion,  is  a  shrewd  measurer  of  weaknesses,  and 
not  without  a  spark  or  two  of  kindly  feeling.  See  first  his 
sketch  of  his  master's  character  to  Mr.  Hammorgaw,  begin- 
ning :  '  He's  no  a'thegither  sae  void  o'  sense,  neither  ; '  and 
then  the  close  of  the  dialogue  :  '  But  the  lad's  no  a  bad  lad 
after  a',  and  he  needs  some  carefu'  body  to  look  after  him.' 

Fourthly.  He  is  a  good  workman  ;  knows  his  own  business 
well,  and  can  judge  of  other  craft,  if  sound,  or  otherwise. 

All  these  four  qualities  of  him  must  be  known  before  we 
can  understand  this  single  speech.  Keeping  them  in  mind, 
I  take  it  up,  word  by  word. 

You  observe,  in  the  outset,  Scott  makes  no  attempt  what- 
ever to  indicate  accents  or  modes  of  pronunciation  by  changed 
spelling,  unless  the  word  becomes  a  quite  definitely  new  and 
scarcely  writeable  one.  The  Scottish  way  of  pronouncing 
'  James,'  for  instance,  is  entirely  peculiar,  and  extremely  pleas- 
ant to  the  ear.  But  it  is  so,  just  because  it  does  not  change 
the  word  into  Jeerns,  nor  into  Jims,  nor  into  Jawms.  A  mod- 
ern writer  of  dialects  would  think  it  amusing  to  use  one  or 
other  of  these  ugly  spellings.  But  Scott  writes  the  name  in 
pure  English,  knowing  that  a  Scots  reader  will  speak  it  right- 
ly, and  an  English  one  be  wise  in  letting  it  alone.  On  the 
other  hand  he  writes  6  weel '  for  £well,'  because  that  word  is 
complete  in  its  change,  and  may  be  very  closely  expressed  by 
the  double  e.  The  ambiguous  c  u's  in  c  gude  '  and  £  sune  '  are 
admitted,  because  far  liker  the  sound  than  the  double  o  would 
be,  and  that  in  6  hure/  for  grace'  sake,  to  soften  the  word  ; — 
so  also  '  flaes  '  for  c  fleas.'  'Mony  '  for  '  many  '  is  again  posi- 
tively right  in  sound,  and  '  neuk 9  differs  from  our  6  nook  '  in 
sense,  and  is  not  the  same  word  at  all,  as  we  shall  presently  see„ 

Secondly,  observe,  not  a  word  is  corrupted  in  any  indecent 
haste,  slowness,  slovenliness,  or  incapacity  of  pronunciation. 
There  is  no  lisping,  drawling,  slobberiug,  or  snuffling  :  the 


180 


FICTION— FAIR  AND  FOUL. 


speech  is  as  clear  as  a  bell  and  as  keen  as  an  arrow :  and  its 
elisions  and  contractions  are  either  melodious,  ('  na,'  for  'not/ 
— cpu'd/  for  'pulled,')  or  as  normal  as  in  a  Latin  verse.  The 
long  words  are  delivered  without  the  slightest  bungling  ;  and 
'  bigging '  finished  to  its  last  g. 

I  take  the  important  words  now  in  their  places. 

Brave.  The  old  English  sense  of  the  word  in  '  to  go  brave  ' 
retained,  expressing  Andrew's  sincere  and  respectful  admira- 
tion. Had  he  meant  to  insinuate  a  hint  of  the  church's  being 
too  fine,  he  would  have  said  £  braw.' 

Kirk.  This  is  of  course  just  as  pure  and  unprovincial  a 
wTord  as  'Kirche,'  or  '  eglise.' 

Whigmaleerie.  I  cannot  get  at  the  root  of  this  word,  but  it 
is  one  showing  that  the  speaker  is  not  bound  by  classic  rules, 
but  will  use  any  syllables  that  enrich  his  meaning.  '  Nip- 
per ty-tipperty  '  (of  his  master's  *  poetry-nonsense ')  is  another 
word  of  the  same  class.  '  Curlieurlie '  is  of  course  just  as  pure 
as  Shakespeare's  6  Hurly-burly.'  But  see  first  suggestion  of 
the  idea  to  Scott  at  Blair-Adam  (L.  vi.  264). 

Opensteek  hemx.  More  description,  or  better,  of  the  later 
Gothic  cannot  be  put  into  four  syllables.  '  Steek,'  melodious 
for  stitch,  has  a  combined  sense  of  closing  or  fastening.  And 
note  that  the  later  Gothic,  being  precisely  what  Scott  knew 
best  (in  Melrose)  and  liked  best,  it  is,  here  as  elsewhere,  quite 
as  much  himself  1  as  Frank,  that  he  is  laughing  at,  when  he 
laughs  with  Andrew,  whose  £  opensteek  hems  '  are  only  a  ruder 
metaphor  for  his  own  '  willow-wreaths  changed  to  stone.' 

Gunpoivthe?\  '  -Ther  •  is  a  lingering  vestige  of  the  French 
£-dre.' 

Syne.  One  of  the  melodious  and  mysterious  Scottish  words 
which  have  partly  the  sound  of  wind  and  stream  in  them,  and 
partly  the  range  of  softened  idea  which  is  like  a  distance  of 
blue  hills  over  border  land  ('  far  in  the  distant  Cheviot's  blue '). 
Perhaps  even  the  least  sympathetic  '  Engiisher '  might  recog- 
nise this,  if  he  heard  '  Old  Long  Since '  vocally  substituted 

1  There  are  three  definite  and  intentional  portraits  of  himself,  in  the 
novels,  each  giving  a  separate  part  of  himself  :  Mr.  Oldbtick,  Frank  Os* 
baldistone,  and  Alan  Fairford. 


FICTION—FAIR  AND  FOUL. 


181 


for  the  Scottish  words  to  the  air.  I  do  not  know  the  root; 
but  the  word's  proper  meaning  is  not  '  since/  but  before  or 
after  an  interval  of  some  duration,  4  as  weel  sune  as  syne/ 
'  But  first  on  Sawnie  gies  a  ca'.  Syne,  bauldly  in  she  enters.' 

Behoved  (to  come).  A  rich  word,  with  peculiar  idiom,  al- 
ways used  more  or  less  ironically  of  anything  done  under  a 
partly  mistaken  and  partly  pretended  notion  of  duty. 

Siccan.  Far  prettier,  and  fuller  in  meaning  than  'such.' 
It  contains  an  added  sense  of  wonder ;  and  means  properly 
'  so  great '  or  c  so  unusual.' 

Took  (o*  drum).  Classical  f  tuck  '  from  Italian  '  toccata,'  the 
preluding  'touch'  or  flourish,  on  any  instrument  (but  see 
Johnson  under  word  £  tucket,'  quoting  Othello).  The  deeper 
Scottish  vowels  are  used  here  to  mark  the  deeper  sound  of 
the  bass  drum,  as  in  more  solemn  warning. 

Bigging.  The  only  word  in  all  the  sentence  of  which  the 
Scottish  form  is  less  melodious  than  the  English,  '  and  what 
for  no,'  seeing  that  Scottish  architecture  is  mostly  little  be- 
yond Bessie  Bell's  and  Mary  Gray's  ?  *  They  biggit  a  bow're 
by  yon  burnside,  and  theekit  it  ow're  wi  rashes.'  But  it  is 
pure  Anglo-Saxon  in  roots  ;  see  glossary  to  Fairbairn's  edition 
of  the  Douglas  Virgil,  1710. 

Coup.  Another  of  the  much-embracing  words  ;  short  for 
i  upset/  but  with  a  sense  of  awkwardness  as  the  inherent 
cause  of  fall ;  compare  Bichie  Moniplies  (also  for  sense  of 
f  behoved ') :  '  Ae  auld  hirplin  deevil  of  a  potter  behoved  just 
to  step  in  my  way,  and  offer  me  a  pig  (earthern  pot — etym. 
dub.),  as  he  said  cc  just  to  put  my  Scotch  ointment  in  ;"  and  I 
gave  him  a  push,  as  but  natural,  and  the  tottering  deevil 
coupit  owre  amang  his  own  pigs,  and  damaged  a  score  of 
them/  So  also  Dandie  Dinmont  in  the  postchaise  :  '  'Od  !  I 
hope  they'll  no  coup  us.' 

The  Grans.  Idiomatic  ;  root  unknown  to  me,  but  it  means 
in  this  use,  full,  total,  and  without  recovery. 

Molendinar.  From  *  molendinum,'  the  grinding-place.  I  do 
not  know  if  actually  the  local  name/  or  Scott's  invention. 

1  Andrew  knows  Latin,  and  might  have  coined  the  word  in  his  con- 
ceit ;  but,  writing  to  a  kind  friend  in  Glasgow,  I  find  the  brook  wa$ 


182 


FICTION— FAIR  AND  FOUL. 


Compare  Sir  Piercie's  '  Molinaras/  But  at  all  events  used 
here  with  bye-sense  of  degradation  of  the  formerly  idle  saints 
to  grind  at  the  mill. 

Grouse.    Courageous,  softened  with  a  sense  of  comfort. 

Ilka.  Again  a  word  wTith  azure  distance,  including  the 
whole  sense  of  '  each '  and  '  every/  The  reader  must  carefully 
and  reverently  distinguish  these  comprehensive  words,  which 
gather  two  or  more  perfectly  understood  meanings  into  one 
chord  of  meaning,  and  are  harmonies  more  than  words,  from 
the  above-noted  blunders  between  two  half -hit  meanings, 
struck  as  a  bad  piano-player  strikes  the  edge  of  another  note. 
In  English  we  have  fewer  of  these  combined  thoughts  ;  so 
that  Shakespeare  rather  plays  with  the  distinct  lights  of  his 
words,  than  melts  them  into  one.  So  again  Bishop  Douglas 
spells,  and  doubtless  spoke,  the  word  •  rose/  differently,  ac- 
cording to  his  purpose  ;  if  as  the  chief  or  governing  ruler  of 
flowers,  'rois/  but  if  only  in  her  own  beauty,  rose. 

Christian-like.  The  sense  of  the  decency  and  order  proper 
to  Christianity  is  stronger  in  Scotland  than  in  any  other  coun- 
try, and  the  word  '  Christian '  more  distinctly  opposed  to 
'beast/  Hence  the  back-handed  cut  at  the  English  for  their 
over-pious  care  of  dogs. 

I  am  a  little  surprised  myself  at  the  length  to  which  this 
examination  of  one  small  piece  of  Sir  Walter's  first-rate  work 
has  carried  us,  but  here  I  must  end  for  this  time,  trusting,  if 
the  Editor  of  the  Nineteenth  Century  permit  me,  yet  to  tres- 
pass, perhaps  more  than  once,  on  his  readers'  patience  ;  but, 
at  all  events,  to  examine  in  a  following  paper  the  technical 
characteristics  of  Scott's  own  style,  both  in  prose  and  verse, 

called  '  Molyndona '  even  before  the  building  of  the  Sub-dean  Mill  in 
1446.  See  also  account  of  the  locality  in  Mr.  George's  admirable  vol- 
ume, Old  Glasgow,  pp.  129,  149,  &c.  The  Protestantism  of  Glasgow, 
since  throwing  that  powder  of  saints  into  her  brook  Kidron,  lias  pre- 
sented it  with  other  pious  offerings ;  and  my  friend  goes  on  to  say  that 
the  brook,  once  famed  for  the  purity  of  its  waters  (much  used  for  bleach- 
ing\  'has  for  nearly  a  hundred  years  been  a  crawling  stream  of  loath- 
someness. It  is  now  bricked  over,  and  a  carriage-way  made  on  the  top 
of  it ;  underneath  the  foul  mess  still  passes  through  the  heart  of  the 
city,  till  it  falls  into  the  Clyde  close  to  the  harbour/ 


FICTION— FAIR  AND  FOUL. 


183 


together  with  Byron's,  as  opposed  to  our  fashionably  recent 
dialects  and  rhythms  ;  the  essential  virtues  of  language,  in 
both  the  masters  of  the  old  school,  hinging  ultimately,  little 
as  it  might  be  thought,  on  certain  unalterable  views  of  theirs 
concerning  the  code  called  £of  the  Ten  Commandments/ 
wholly  at  variance  with  the  dogmas  of  automatic  morality 
which,  summed  again  by  the  witches'  line,  '  Fair  is  foul,  and 
foul  is  fair,'  hover  through  the  fog  and  filthy  air  of  our  pros- 
perous England. 

John  Euskin. 

\  He  haled  greetings  in  the  market-place,  and  there  were  gener- 
ally loiterers  in  the  streets  to  persecute  him  either  about  the 
events  of  the  day,  or  about  some  petty  pieces  of  business.' 

These  lines,  which  the  reader  will  find  near  the  beginning 
of,  the  sixteenth  chapter  of  the  first  volume  of  the  Antiquary, 
contain  two  indications  of  the  old  man's  character,  which,  re- 
ceiving the  ideal  of  him  as  a  portrait  of  Scott  himself,  are  of 
extreme  interest  to  me.  They  mean  essentially  that  neither 
Monkbarns  nor  Scott  had  any  mind  to  be  called  of  men, 
Kabbi,  in  mere  hearing  of  the  mob  ;  and  especially  that  they 
hated  to  be  drawn  back  out  of  their  far-away  thoughts,  or 
forward  out  of  their  long-ago  thoughts,  by  any  manner  of 
'  daily '  news,  whether  printed  or  gabbled.  Of  wdiich  two 
vital  characteristics,  deeper  in  both  the  men,  (for  I  must 
always  speak  of  Scott's  creations  as  if  they  were  as  real  as 
himself,)  than  any  of  their  superficial  vanities,  or  passing  en- 
thusiasms, I  have  to  speak  more  at  another  time.  I  quote  the 
passage  just  now,  because  there  was  one  piece  of  the  daily 
news  of  the  year  1815  which  did  extremely  interest  Scott,  and 
materially  direct  the  labour  of  the  latter  part  of  his  life  ;  nor 
is  there  any  piece  of  history  in  this  whole  nineteenth  century 
quite  so  pregnant  with  various  instruction  as  the  study  of  the 
reasons  which  influenced  Scott  and  Byron  in  their  opposite 
views  of  the  glories  of  the  battle  of  Waterloo. 

But  I  quote  it  for  another  reason  also.  The  principal 
greeting  which  Mr.  Oldbuck  on  this  occasion  receives  in  the 
market-place,  being  compared  with  the  speech  of  Andrew 


184 


FICTION—FAIR  AND  FOUL. 


Fairservice,  examined  in  my  first  paper,  will  furnish  me  with 
the  text  of  what  I  have  mainly  to  say  in  the  present  one. 

' "  Mr.  Oldbuck,"  said  the  town-clerk  (a  more  important 
person,  who  came  in  front  and  ventured  to  stop  the  old  gentle- 
man), "the  provost,  understanding  you  were  in  town,  begs  on 
no  account  that  you'll  quit  it  without  seeing  him  ;  he  wants 
to  speak  to  ye  about  bringing  the  water  frae  the  Fairwell 
spring  through  a  part  o'  your  lands." 

'  "  What  the  deuce  ! — have  they  nobody's  land  but  mine  to 
cut  and  carve  on? — I  won't  consent,  tell  them." 

'  "  And  the  provost,"  said  the  clerk,  going  on,  without 
noticing  the  rebuff,  "  and  the  council,  wad  be  agreeable  that 
you  should  hae  the  auld  stanes  at  Donagild's  Chapel,  that  ye 
was  wussing  to  hae." 

c  "  Eh  ? — what  ? — Oho  !  that's  another  story — Well,  well, 
I'll  call  upon  the  provost,  and  we'll  talk  about  it." 

' "  But  ye  maun  speak  your  mind  on't  forthwith,  Monk- 
barns,  if  ye  want  the  stanes  ;  for  Deacon  Harlewalls  thinks 
the  carved  through-stanes  might  be  put  with  advantage  on 
the  front  of  the  new  council-house — that  is,  the  twa  cross- 
legged  figures  that  the  callants  used  to  ca'  Bobbin  and  Bob- 
bin, ane  on  ilka  door-cheek ;  and  the  other  stane,  that  they 
ca'd  Ailie  Dailie,  abune  the  door.  It  will  be  very  tastefu',  the 
Deacon  says,  and  just  in  the  style  of  modern  Gothic." 

* "  Good  Lord  deliver  me  from  this  Gothic  generation  ! " 
exclaimed  the  Antiquary, — "  a  monument  of  a  knight-templar 
on  each  side  of  a  Grecian  porch,  and  a  Madonna  on  the  top 
of  it ! — 0  crimini  ! — Well,  tell  the  provost  I  wish  to  have  the 
stones,  and  we'll  not  differ  about  the  water-course.— It's  lucky 
I  happened  to  come  this  way  to-day." 

'  They  parted  mutually  satisfied  ;  but  the  wily  clerk  had 
most  reason  to  exult  in  the  dexterity  he  had  displayed,  since 
the  whole  proposal  of  an  exchange  between  the  monuments 
(which  the  council  had  determined  to  remove  as  a  nuisance, 
because  they  encroached  three  feet  upon  the  public  road)  and 
the  privilege  of  conveying  the  water  to  the  burgh,  through 
the  estate,  of  Monkbarns,  was  an  idea  which  had  originated 
with  himself  upon  the  pressure  of  the  moment.' 


FICTION— FAIR  AND  FOUL. 


185 


In  this  single  page  of  Scott,  will  the  reader  please  note  the 
kind  of  prophetic  instinct  with  which  the  great  men  of  every 
age  mark  and  forecast  its  destinies?  The  water  from  the 
Fairwell  is  the  future  Thirlmere  carried  to  Manchester  ;  the 
'  auld  stanes ' 1  at  Donagild's  Chapel,  removed  as  a  nuisance, 

1  The  following  fragments  out  of  the  letters  in  ray  own  possession, 
written  by  Scott  to  the  builder  of  Abbots  tor d,  as  the  outer  decorations 
of  the  house  were  in  process  of  completion,  will  show  how  accurately 
Scott  had  pictured  himself  in  Monkbarns. 

'  Abbotsford  :  April  21,  1817. 
1  Dear  Sir, — Nothing  can  be  more  obliging  than  your  attention  to  the 
old  stones.  You  have  been  as  true  as  the  sundial  itself/  [The  sundial 
had  just  been  erected.]  4  Of  the  two  I  would  prefer  the  larger  one,  as 
it  is  to  be  in  front  of  a  parapet  quite  in  the  old  taste.  But  in  case  of 
accidents  it  will  be  safest  in  your  custody  till  I  come  to  town  again  on 
the  12th  of  May.  Your  former  favours  (which  were  weighty  as  accept- 
able) have  come  safely  out  here,  and  will  be  disposed  of  with  great 
effect. » 

!  Abbotsford  :  July  30. 
4 1  fane}'  the  Tolbooth  still  keeps  its  feet,  but,  as  it  must  soon  descend, 
I  hope  you  will  remember  me.  I  have  an  important  use  for  the  niche 
above  the  door  ;  and  though  many  a  man  has  got  a  niche  in  the  Tol- 
booth by  building,  I  believe  I  am  the  first  that  ever  got  a  niche  out  of 
it  on  such  an  occasion.  For  which  I  have  to  thank  your  kindness,  and 
to  remain  very  much  your  obliged  humble  servant, 

'  Walter  Scott.' 
4  August  16. 

'  My  dear  Sir, — I  trouble  you  with  this  [sic]  few  lines  to  thank  you 
for  the  very  accurate  drawings  and  measurements  of  the  Tolbooth  door, 
and  for  your  kind  promise  to  attend  to  my  interest  and  that  of  Abbots^ 
ford  in  the  matter  of  the  Thistle  and  Fleur  de  Lis.  Most  of  our  scutch- 
eons are  now  mounted,  and  look  very  well,  as  the  house  is  something 
after  the  model  of  an  old  hall  (not  a  castle),  where  such  things  are  well 
in  character.'  [Alas — Sir  Walter,  Sir  Walter  !]  'I  intend  the  old  lion 
to  predominate  over  a  well  which  the  children  have  christened  the 
Fountain  of  the  Lions.  His  present  den,  however,  continues  to  be  the 
hall  at  Castle  Street.' 

'  September  5. 

1  Dear  Sir, — I  am  greatly  obliged  to  you  for  securing  the  stone.  I  am 
not  sure  that  I  will  put  up  the  gate  quite  in  the  old  form,  but  I  would 
like  to  secure  the  means  of  doing  so.    The  ornamental  stones  are  now 


18G 


FICTION-FAIR  AND  FOUL. 


foretell  the  necessary  view  taken  by  modern  cockneyism, 
Liberalism,  and  progress,  of  all  things  that  remind  them  of 
the  noble  dead,  of  their  father's  fame,  or  of  their  own  duty  ; 
and  the  public  road  becomes  their  idol,  instead  of  the  saint's 
shrine.  Finally,  the  roguery  of  the  entire  transaction — the 
mean  man  seeing  the  weakness  of  the  honourable,  and  'best- 
ing '  him — in  modern  slang,  in  the  manner  and  at  the  pace  of 
modern  trade — '  on  the  pressure  of  the  moment.' 

But  neither  are  these  things  what  I  have  at  present  quoted 
the  passage  for. 

I  quote  it,  that  wre  may  consider  how  much  wonderful  and 
various  history  is  gathered  in  the  fact,  recorded  for  us  in  this 
piece  of  entirely  fair  fiction,  that  in  the  Scottish  borough  of 
Fairport,  (Montrose,  really,)  in  the  year  17 —  of  Christ,  the 
knowledge  given  by  the  pastors  and  teachers  provided  for  its 
children  by  enlightened  Scottish  Protestantism,  of  their 
fathers'  history,  and  the  origin  of  their  religion,  had  resulted 
in  this  substance  and  sum  ; — that  the  statues  of  two  crusading 
knights  had  become,  to  their  children,  Eobin  and  Bobbin  ; 
and  the  statue  of  the  Madonna,  Ailie  Bailie. 

A  marvellous  piece  of  history,  truly :  and  far  too  compre- 
hensive for  general  comment  here.  Only  one  small  piece  of 
it  I  must  carry  forward  the  readers'  thoughts  upon. 

The  pastors  and  teachers  aforesaid,  (represented  typically  in 
another  part  of  this  errorless  book  by  Mr.  Blattergowl)  are 

put  up,  and  have  a  very  happy  effect.  If  you  will  have  the  kindness 
to  let  me  know  when  the  Tolbooth  door  comes  down,  I  will  send  in  my 
carts  for  the  stones  ;  I  have  an  admirable  situation  for  it.  I  suppose  the 
door  itself  [he  means,  the  wooden  one]  '  will  be  kept  for  the  new  jail ; 
if  not,  and  not  otherwise  wanted,  I  would  esteem  it  curious  to  possess 
it.  Certainly  I  hope  so  many  sore  hearts  will  not  pass  through  the 
celebrated  door  when  in  my  possession  as  heretofore/ 

1  September  8. 

4 1  should  esteem  it  very  fortunate  if  I  could  have  the  door  also, 
though  I  suppose  it  is  modern,  having  been  burned  down  at  the  time  of 
Porte  o  us-mob. 

'  I  am  very  much  obliged  to  the  gentlemen  who  thought  these  re- 
mains of  the  Heart  of  Midlothian  are  not  ill  bestowed  on  their  intended 
possessor.' 


FICTION— FAIR  AND  FOUL. 


187 


not,  whatever  else  they  may  have  to  answer  for,  answerable 
for  these  names.  The  names  are  of  the  children's  own  choos- 
ing and  bestowing,  but  not  of  the  children's  own  inventing. 
1  Robin  '  is  a  classically  endearing  cognomen,  recording  the 
errant  heroism  of  old  days — the  name  of  the  Bruce  and  of 
Rob  Roy.  'Bobbin  •  is  a  poetical  and  symmetrical  fulfilment 
and  adornment  of  the  original  phrase.  '  Ailie '  is  the  last 
echo  of  '  Ave,'  changed  into  the  softest  Scottish  Christian 
name  familiar  to  the  children,  itself  the  beautiful  feminine 
form  of  royal  1  Louis;'  the  'Dailie'  again  symmetrically 
added  for  hinder  and  more  musical  endearment.  The  last 
vestiges,  you  see,  of  honour  for  the  heroism  and  religion  of 
their  ancestors,  lingering  on  the  lips  of  babes  and  sucklings. 

But  what  is  the  meaning  of  this  necessity  the  children  find 
themselves  under  of  completing  the  nomenclature  rhythmi- 
cally and  rhymingly  ?  Note  first  the  difference  carefully,  and 
the  attainment  of  both  qualities  by  the  couplets  in  question. 
Rhythm  is  the  syllabic  and  quantitative  measure  of  the  words, 
in  which  Robin,  both  in  weight  and  time,  balances  Bobbin  ; 
and  Dailie  holds  level  scale  with  Ailie.  But  rhyme  is  the 
added  correspondence  of  sound  ;  unknown  and  undesired,  so 
far  as  we  can  learn,. by  the  Greek  Orpheus,  but  absolutely 
essential  to,  and,  as  special  virtue,  becoming  titular  of,  the 
Scottish  Thomas. 

The  6  Ryme,'  1  you  may  at  first  fancy,  is  the  especially 
childish  part  of  the  work.  Not  so.  It  is  the  especially  chiv- 
alric  and  Christian  part  of  it.  It  characterises  the  Christian 
chant  or  canticle,  as  a  higher  thing  than  a  Greek  ode,  melos, 
or  hymnos,  or  than  a  Latin  carmen. 

Think  of  it,  for  this  again  is  wonderful !  That  these  chil- 
dren of  Montrose  should  have  an  element  of  music  in  their 
souls  which  Homer  had  not, — wfaiph  a  melos  of  David  the 
Prophet  and  King  had  not, — which  Orpheus  and  Amphion 
had  not, — which  Apollo's  unrymed  oracles  became  mute  at 
the  sound  of. 

1  Henceforward,  not  in  affectation,  but  for  the  reader's  better  con- 
venience, I  shall  continue  to  spell  '  Ryrne '  without  our  wrongly 
added  h. 


188 


FICTION— FAIR  AND  FOUL. 


A  strange  new  equity  this, — melodious  justice  and  judg- 
ment as  it  were, — in  all  words  spoken  solemnly  and  ritualist- 
ically  by  Christian  human  creatures  ; — Robin  and  Bobbin — 
by  the  Crusader's  tomb,  up  to  '  Dies  iree,  dies  ilia/  at  judg- 
ment of  the  crusading  soul. 

You  have  to  understand  this  most  deeply  of  all  Christian 
minstrels,  from  first  to  last ;  that  they  are  more  musical,  be- 
cause more  joyful,  than  any  others  on  earth  :  ethereal  min- 
strels, pilgrims  of  the  sky,  true  to  the  kindred  points  of 
heaven  and  home  ;  their  joy  essentially  the  sky-lark's,  in 
light,  in  purity  ;  but,  with  their  human  eyes,  looking  for  the 
glorious  appearing  of  something  in  the  sky,  which  the  bird 
cannot. 

This  it  is  that  changes  Etruscan  murmur  into  Terza  rima — 
Horatian  Latin  into  Provencal  troubadour's  melody  ;  not,  be- 
cause less  artful,  less  wise. 

Here  is  a  little  bit,  for  instance,  of  French  ryming  just 
before  Chaucer's  time— near  enough  to  our  own  French  to  be 
intelligible  to  us  yet. 

'  O  quant  tres-glorieuse  vie, 
Quant  cil  quit  out  pent  et  maistrie, 
Veult  esprouver  pour  necessaire, 
Ne  pour  quant  ii  ne  blasma  mie 
La  vie  de  Marthe  sa  mie  : 
Mais  il  lui  donna  exemplaire 
D'autrement  vivre,  et  de  bien  plaire 
A  Dieu  ;  et  plut  de  bien  a  faire : 
Pour  se  conclut-il  que  Marie 
Qui  estoit  a  ses  piedz  sans  braire, 
Et  pensait  d'entendre  et  de  taire, 
Estleut  la  plus  saine  partie. 

La  meilleur  partie  esleut-eiie 
Et  la  plus  saine  et  la  plus  belle, 
Qui  ja  ne  luy  sera  ostee 
Car  par  verite  se  fut  celle 
Qui  fut  tousjours  fresche  et  nouvelle, 
D'aymer  Dieu  et  d'en  estre  aymee; 
Car  jusqu'au  cueur  fut  entam$e, 
Et  si  ardamment  enflamee, 


FICTION— FAIR  AND  FOUL. 


189 


Que  tous-jours  ardoit  l'estincelle  ; 
Par  quoi  elle  fut  visitee 
Et  de  Dieu  premier  comfortee  ; 
Car  charite  est  trop  ysnelle.' 

The  only  law  of  metre,  observed  in  this  song,  is  that  each 
line  shall  be  octosyllabic  : 

Qui  fut  |  tous jours  |  fresche  et  |  nouvelle, 
B'autre  |  ment  vi  |  vret  de  |  bien  (ben)  plaire, 
Et  pen  |  soit  den  J  tendret  |  de  taire 

But  the  reader  must  note  that  words  which  were  two-syllabled 
in  Latin  mostly  remain  yet  so  in  the  French. 

La  xi  |  e  de  |  Marthe  |  sa  mie, 
although  mie,  which  is  pet  language,  loving  abbreviation  of 
arnica  through  amie,  remains  monosyllabic.    But  vie  elides  its 
e  before  a  vowel : 

Car  Mar-  |  the  me  |  nait  vie  |  active 
Et  Ma-  |  ri-e  |  contemp  |  lative  ; 

and  custom  endures  many  exceptions.  Thus  Marie  may  be 
three-syllabled  as  above,  or  answer  to  mie  as  a  dissyllable  ; 
but  vierge  is  always,  I  think,  dissyllabic,  vier-ge,  with  even 
stronger  accent  on  the  -ge,  for  the  Latin  -go. 

Then,  secondly,  of  quantity,  there  is  scarcely  any  fixed  law. 
The  metres  may  be  timed  as  the  minstrel  chooses — fast  or 
slow — and  the  iambic  current  checked  in  reverted  eddy,  as 
the  words  chance  to  come. 

But,  thirdly,  there  is  to  be  rich  ryming  and  chiming,  no 
matter  how  simply  got,  so  only  that  the  words  jingle  and 
tingle  together  with  due  art  of  interlacing  and  answering  in 
different  parts  of  the  stanza,  correspondent  to  the  involutions 
of  tracery  and  illumination.  The  whole  twelve-line  -stanza 
is  thus  constructed  with  two  rymes  only,  six  of  each,  thus 
arranged  : 

A  A  B  |  A  A  B  |  BBA  |  BBA  | 

dividing  the  verse  thus  into  four  measures,  reversed  in  ascent 
and  descent,  or  descant  more  properly  ;  and  doubtless  with 


190 


FICTION— FAIR  AND  FOUL. 


correspondent  phases  in  the  voice-given,  and  duly  accompany- 
ing, or  following,  music  ;  Thomas  the  Eymer's  own  precept, 
that  '  tong  is  chefe  in  mynstrelsye,'  being  always  kept  faithfully 
in  mind. 1 

Here  then  you  have  a  sufficient  example  of  the  pure  chant 
of  the  Christian  ages ;  which  is  always  at  heart  joyful,  and 
divides  itself  into  the  four  great  forms,  Song  of  Praise,  Song 
of  Prayer,  Song  of  Love,  and  Song  of  Battle  ;  praise,  however, 
being  the  keynote  of  passion  through  all  the  four  forms  ;  ac- 
cording to  the  first  law  which  I  have  already  given  in  the  laws 
of  Fesole  ;  6  all  great  Art  is  Praise/  of  which  the  contrary  is 
also  true,  all  foul  or  miscreant  Art  is  accusation,  Sia/3o\^  : 
'  She  gave  me  of  the  tree  and  I  did  eat '  being  an  entirely 
museless  expression  on  Adam's  part,  the  briefly  essential  con- 
trary of  Love-song. 

With  these  four  perfect  forms  of  Christian  chant,  of  which 
we  may  take  for  pure  examples  the  '  Te  Deum/  the  '  Te  Lucis 
Ante,'  the  '  Amor  che  nella  mente/  2  and  the  '  Chant  de  Poland/ 
are  mingled  songs  of  mourning,  of  Pagan  origin  (whether 
Greek  or  Danish),  holding  grasp  still  of  the  races  that  have 
once  learned  them,  in  times  of  suffering  and  sorrow  ;  and 
songs  of  Christian  humiliation  or  grief,  regarding  chiefly  the 
sufferings  of  Christ,  or  the  conditions  of  our  own  sin  :  while 
through  the  entire  system  of  these  musical  complaints  are 
interwoven  moralities,  instructions,  and  related  histories,  in 
illustration  of  both,  passing  into  Epic  and  Eom antic  verse, 
which  gradually,  as  the  forms  and  learnings  of  society  increase, 
becomes  less  joyful,  and  more  didactic,  or  satiric,  until  the 

1  L.  ii.  278. 

-  'Che  nella  mente  mia  rac/iona.'  Love — you  observe,  the  highest 
Reasonableness,  instead  of  French  ivrcsse,  or  even  Shakespearian  '  mere 
folly •  ;  and  Beatrice  as  the  Goddess  of  Wisdom  in  this  third  song  of  the 
ConvitOy  to  be  compared  with  the  Revolutionary  Goddess  of  Reason  : 
remembering  of  the  "whole  poem  chiefly  the  line  :  — 

'  Costei  penso  chi  che  mosso  Puniverso.' 

(See  Lyell's  Canzoniere,  p.  104.) 


FICTION— FAIR  AND  FOUL. 


191 


last  echoes  of  Christian  joy  and  melody  vanish  in  the  '  Vanity 
of  human  wishes.' 

And  here  I  must  pause  for  a  minute  or  two  to  separate  the 
different  branches  of  our  inquiry  clearly  from  one  another. 
For  one  thing,  the  reader  mast  please  put  for  the  present  out 
of  his  head  all  thought  of  the  progress  of  '  civilisation  ' — that 
is  to  say,  broadly,  of  the  substitution  of  wigs  for  hair,  gas  for 
candles,  and  steam  for  legs.  This  is  an  entirely  distinct  mat- 
ter from  the  phases  of  policy  and  religion.  It  has  nothing  to 
do  with  the  British  Constitution,  or  the  French  Revolution, 
or  the  unification  of  Italy.  There  are,  indeed,  certain  subtle 
relations  between  the  state  of  mind,  for  instance,  in  Venice, 
which  makes  her  prefer  a  steamer  to  a  gondola,  and  that 
which  makes  her  prefer  a  gazetteer  to  a  duke  ;  but  these  re- 
lations are  not  at  all  to  be  dealt  with  until  we  solemnly  under- 
stand that  whether  men  shall  be  Christians  and  poets,  or 
infidels  and  dunces,  does  not  depend  on  the  way  they  cut 
their  hair,  tie  their  breeches,  or  light  their  fires.  Dr.  John- 
son might  have  worn  his  wig  in  fulness  conforming  to  his 
dignity,  without  therefore  coming  to  the  conclusion  that 
human  wishes  were  vain  ;  nor  is  Queen  Antoinette's  civilised 
hair-powder,  as  opposed  to  Queen  Bertha's  savagely  loose 
hair,  the  cause  of  Antoinette's  laying  her  head  at  last  in  scaf- 
fold dust,  but  Bertha  in  a  pilgrim-haunted  tomb. 

Again,  I  have  just  now  used  the  words  'poet'  and  'dunce,' 
meaning  the  degree  of  each  quality  possible  to  average  human 
nature.  Men  are  eternally  divided  into  the  two  classes  of  poet 
(believer,  maker,  and  praiser)  and  dunce  (or  unbeliever,  un- 
maker,  and  dispraiser).  And  in  process  of  ages  they  have  the 
power  of  making  faithful  and  formative  creatures  of  them- 
selves, or  unfaithful  and  reformative.  And  this  distinction 
between  the  creatures  who,  blessing,  are  blessed,  and  evermore 
benedicti,  and  the  creatures  who,  cursing,  are  cursed,  and  ever- 
more maledicti,  is  one  going  through  all  humanity;  antediluvian 
in  Cain  and  Abel,  diluvian  in  Ham  and  Shem.  And  the  ques- 
tion for  the  public  of  any  given  period  is  not  whether  they  are 
a  constitutional  or  unconstitutional  vulgus,  but  whether  they 
are  a  benignant  or  malignant  vulgus.    So  also,  whether  it  $ 


192 


FICTION— FAIR  AND  FOUL. 


indeed  the  gods  who  have  given  any  gentleman  the  grace  to 
despise  the  rabble,  depends  wholly  on  whether  it  is  indeed  the 
rabble,  or  he,  who  are  the  malignant  persons. 

But  yet  again.  This  difference  between  the  persons  to 
whom  Heaven,  according  to  Orpheus,  has  granted  \  the  hour 
of  delight,'  1  and  those  whom  it  has  condemned  to  the  hour 
of  detestableness,  being,  as  I  have  just  said,  of  all  times  and 
nations, — it  is  an  interior  and  more  delicate  difference  which 
we  are  examining  in  the  gift  of  Christian,  as  distinguished  from 
unchristian,  song.  Orpheus,  Pindar,  and  Horace  are  indeed 
distinct  from  the  prosaic  rabble,  as  the  bird  from  the  snake ; 
but  between  Orpheus  and  Palestrina,  Horace  and  Sidney, 
there  is  another  division,  and  a  new  power  of  music  and  song 
given  to  the  humanity  which  has  hope  of  the  Eesurrection. 

This  is  the  root  of  all  life  and  all  rightness  in  Christian 
harmony,  whether  of  word  or  instrument ;  and  so  literally, 
that  in  precise  manner  as  this  hope  disappears,  the  power  of 
song  is  taken  away,  and  taken  away  utterly.  "When  the  Chris- 
tian falls  back  out  of  the  bright  hope  of  the  Eesurrection,  even 
the  Orpheus  song  is  forbidden  him.  Not  to  have  known  the 
hope  is  blameless :  one  may  sing,  unknowing,  as  the  swan,  or 
Philomela.  But  to  have  known  and  fall  away  from  it,  and  to 
declare  that  the  human  wishes,  which  are  summed  in  that  one 
— 'Thy  kingdom  come'— are  vain  !  The  Fates  ordain  there 
shall  be  no  singing  after  that  denial. 

For  observe  this,  and  earnestly.  The  old  Orphic  song,  with 
its  dim  hope  of  yet  once  more  Eurydice, — the  Philomela  song 
—  granted  after  the  cruel  silence,  —  the  Halcyon  song  — 
with  its  fifteen  days  of  peace,  were  all  sad,  or  joyful  only  in 
some  vague  vision  of  conquest  over  death.  But  the  Johnso- 
nian vanity  of  wishes  is  on  the  whole  satisfactory  to  Johnson — 
accepted  with  gentlemanly  resignation  by  Pope — triumphantly 
and  with  bray  of  penny  trumpets  and  blowing  of  steam- 
whistles,  proclaimed  for  the  glorious  discovery  of  the  civilised 
ages,  by  Mrs.  Barbauld,  Miss  Edgeworth,  Adam  Smith,  and 

1  wpau  rrjs  repif/ios— Plato,  Laws,  ii.,  Steph.  6G9.  'Hour'  having  here 
nearly  the  power  of  1  Fate  9  with  added  sense  of  being  a  daughter  of 
Themis, 


FICTION-FAIR  AND  FOUL. 


193 


Co.  There  is  no  God,  but  have  we  not  invented  gunpowder? 
— who  wants  a  God,  with  that  in  his  pocket?  1  There  is  no 
Resurrection,  neither  angel  nor  spirit ;  but  have  we  not  paper 
and  pens,  and  cannot  every  blockhead  print  his  opinions,  and 
the  Day  of  Judgment  become  Republican,  with  everybody  for 
a  judge,  and  the  flat  of  the  universe  for  the  throne  ?  There 
is  no  law,  but  only  gravitation  and  congelation,  and  we  are 
stuck  together  in  an  everlasting  hail,  and  melted  together  in 
everlasting  mud,  and  great  wTas  the  day  in  wThich  our  worships 
were  born.  And  there  is  no  Gospel,  but  only,  whatever  we've 
got,  to  get  more,  and,  wherever  we  are,  to  go  somewhere  else. 
And  are  not  these  discoveries,  to  be  sung  of,  and  drummed 
of,  and  fiddled  of,  and  generally  made  melodiously  indubitable 
in  the  eighteenth  century  song  of  praise  ? 

The  Fates  will  not  have  it  so.  No  word  of  song  is  possible, 
in  that  century,  to  mortal  lips.  Only  polished  versification, 
sententious  pentameter  and  hexameter,  until,  having  turned 
out  its  toes  long  enough  without  dancing,  and  pattered  with 
its  lips  long  enough  without  piping,  suddenly  Astrsea  returns 
to  the  earth,  and  a  Day  of  Judgment  of  a  sort,  and  there  bursts 
out  a  song  at  last  again,  a  most  curtly  melodious  triplet  of 
Amphisbcenic  ryme.   'Ca  ira.1 

Amphisbsenic,  fanged  in  each  ryme  with  fire,  and  obeying 
Ercildoune's  precept,  'Tong  is  chefe  of  mynstrelsye, '  to  the 
syllable. — Don  Giovanni's  hitherto  fondly  chanted  'Andiam, 
andiam,'  become  suddenly  impersonal  and  prophetic  :  It  shall 
go,  and  you  also.    A  cry — before  it  is  a  song,  then  song  and 

1  4  Gunpowder  is  one  of  the  greatest  inventions  of  modern  times,  and 
what  has  given  such  a  superiority  to  civilised  nations  over  barbarous 1 ! 
{Evenings  at  Home — fifth,  evening. )  No  man  can  owe  more  than  I  both 
to  Mrs.  Barbauld  and  Miss  Edgeworth  ;  and  I  only  wish  that  in  the  sub- 
stance of  what  they  wisely  said,  they  had  been  more  listened  to.  Never- 
theless, the  germs  of  all  modern  conceit  and  error  respecting  manufact- 
ure and  industry,  as  rivals  to  Art  and  to  Genius,  are  concentrated  in 
'■Evenings  at  Home  1  and  kHarry  and  Lucy  '-^being  all  the  while  them- 
selves works  of  real  genius,  and  prophetic  of  things  that  have  yet  to  be 
learned  and  fulfilled.  See  for  instance  the  paper,  '  Things  by  their  Right 
Names/  following  the  one  from  which  I  have  just  quoted  (The  Ship\ 
and  closing  the  first  volume  of  the  old  edition  of  the  Evenings. 


194 


FICTION— FAIR  AND  FOUL. 


accompaniment  together — perfectly  done  ;  and  the  march  '  to- 
wards the  field  of  Mars.  The  two  hundred  and  fifty  thousand 
— they  to  the  sound  of  stringed  music — preceded  by  young 
girls  with  tricolor  streamers,  they  have  shouldered  soldier- 
wise  their  shovels  and  picks,  and  with  one  throat  are  singing 
ira.'  1 

Through  all  the  springtime  of  1790,  £  from  Brittany  to  Bur- 
gundy, on  most  plains  of  France,  under  most  city  walls,  there 
march  and  constitutionally  wheel  to  the  Qa-iraing  mood  of 
fife  and  drum — our  clear  glancing  phalanxes  ; — the  song  of 
the  two  hundred  and  fifty  thousand,  virgin  led,  is  in  the  long 
light  of  July.'  Nevertheless,  another  song  is  yet  needed,  for 
phalanx,  and  for  maid.  For,  two  springs  and  summers  having 
gone — amphisbsenic, — on  the  28th  of  August  1792,  '  Dumou- 
riez  rode  from  the  camp  of  Maulde,  eastwards  to  Sedan.9  2 

And  Longwi  has  fallen  basely,  and  Brunswick  and  the  Prus- 
sian king  will  beleaguer  Verdun,  and  Clairfait  and  the  Aus- 
trians  press  deeper  in  over  the  northern  marches,  Cimmerian 
Europe  behind.  And  on  that  same  night  Dumouriez  as- 
sembles council  of  war  at  his  lodgings  in  Sedan.  Prussians 
here,  Austrian s  there,  triumphant  both.  With  broad  highway 
to  Paris  and  little  hindrance — we  scattered,  helpless  here  and 
there — what  to  advise  ?  The  generals  advise  retreating,  and 
retreating  till  Paris  be  sacked  at  the  latest  day  possible. 
Dumouriez,  silent,  dismisses  them, — keeps  only,  with  a  sign, 
Thouvenot.  Silent,  thus,  when  needful,  yet  having  voice,  it 
appears,  of  what  musicians  call  tenor-quality,  of  a  rare  kind. 
Rubini-esque,  even,  but  scarcely  producible  to  fastidious  ears 
at  opera.  The  seizure  of  the  forest  of  Argonne  follows — the 
cannonade  of  V almy.  The  Prussians  do  not  march  on  Paris 
this  time,  the  autumnal  hours  of  fate  pass  on — pa  ira — and  on 
the  6th  of  November,  Dumouriez  meets  the  Austrians  also. 
4  Dumouriez  wide-winged,  they  wide-winged — at  and  around 
Jemappes,  its  green  heights  fringed  and  maned  with  red  fire. 
And  Dumouriez  is  swept  back  on  this  wing  and  swept  back 

1  Carlyle,  French  Revolution  (Chapman,  1869),  vol.  ii.  p.  70  ;  conf.  p, 
25,  and  the  fa  ira  at  Arras,  vol.  iii.  p.  276. 
*  Ibid,  iii,  26. 


FICTION— FAIR  AND  FOUL. 


195 


on  that,  and  is  like  to  be  swept  back  utterly,  when  he  rushes 
up  in  person,  speaks  a  prompt  word  or  two,  and  then,  with 
clear  tenor-pipe,  uplifts  the  hymn  of  the  Marseillaise,  ten 
thousand  tenor  or  bass  pipes  joining,  or  say  some  forty  thou- 
sand in  all,  for  every  heart  leaps  up  at  the  sound  ;  and  so,  with 
rhythmic  march  melody,  they  rally,  they  advance,  they  rush 
death-defying,  and  like  the  fire  whirlwind  sweep  all  manner 
of  Austrians  from  the  scene  of  action/  Thus,  through  the 
lips  of  Dumouriez,  sings  Tyrteus,  Rouget  cle  Lisle,1  'Aux 
armes — marchons  ! '  Iambic  measure  with  a  witness  !  in  what 
wide  strophe  here  beginning — in  what  unthought-of  anti- 
strophe  returning  to  that  council  chamber  in  Sedan  ! 

While  these  two  great  songs  were  thus  being  composed, 
and  sung,  and  danced  to  in  cometary  cycle,  by  the  French 
nation,  here  in  our  less  giddy  island  there  rose,  amidst  hours 
of  business  in  Scotland  and  of  idleness  in  England,  three 
troubadours  of  quite  different  temper.  Different  also  them- 
selves, but  not  opponent ;  forming  a  perfect  chord,  and  ad- 
verse all  the  three  of  them  alike  to  the  French  musicians,  in 
this  main  point — that  while  the  £7a  ira  and  Marseillaise  were 
essentially  songs  of  blame  and  wrath,  the  British  bards  wrote, 
virtually,  always  songs  of  praise,  though  by  no  means  psalmody 
in  the  ancient  keys.  On  the  contrary,  all  the  three  are  alike 
moved  by  a  singular  antipathy  to  the  priests,  and  are  pointed 
at  with  fear  and  indignation  by  the  pietists,  of  their  day  ; — 
not  without  latent  cause.  For  they  are  all  of  them,  with  the 
most  loving  service,  servants  of  that  world  which  the  Puritan 
and  monk  alike  despised  ;  and,  in  the  triple  chord  of  their 
song,  could  not  but  appear  to  the  religious  persons  around 
them  as  respectively  and  specifically  the  praisers — Scott  of  the 
world,  Burns  of  the  flesh,  and  Byron  of  the  devil. 

To  contend  with  this  carnal  orchestra,  the  religious  world, 
having  long  ago  rejected  its  Catholic  Psalms  as  antiquated 
and  unscientific,  and  finding  its  Puritan  melodies  sunk  into 
faint  jar  and  twangle  from  their  native  trumpet-tone,  had 
nothing  to  oppose  but  the  innocent,  rather  than  religious, 

1  Carlyle,  French  Revolution^  iii,  106,  the  last  sentence  altered  in  a 
word  or  two. 


196 


FICTION-FAIR  AND.FOVL, 


verses  of  the  school  recognised  as  that  of  the  English  Lakes 
very  creditable  to  them  ;  domestic  at  once  and  refined  ;  ob- 
serving the  errors  of  the  world  outside  of  the  Lakes  with  a 
pitying  and  tender  indignation,  and  arriving  in  lacustrine 
seclusion  at  many  valuable  principles  of  philosophy,  as  pure 
as  the  tarns  of  their  mountains,  and  of  corresponding  depth. 1 

I  have  lately  seen,  and  with  extreme  pleasure,  Mr.  Matthew 
Arnold's  arrangement  of  "Wordsworth's  poems  ;  and  read  wTith 
sincere  interest  his  high  estimate  of  them.  But  a  great  poet's 
work  never  needs  arrangement  by  other  hands  ;  and  though 
it  is  very  proper  that  Silver  How  should  clearly  understand 
and  brightly  praise  its  fraternal  Eydal  Mount,  we  must  not 
forget  that,  over  yonder,  are  the  Andes,  all  the  while. 

Wordsworth's  rank  and  scale  among  poets  were  determined 
by  himself,  in  a  single  exclamation  : — 

*  What  was  tlie  great  Parnassus'  self  to  thee, 
Mount  Skiddaw  I ' 

Answer  his  question  faithfully,  and  you  have  the  relation 
between  the  great  masters  of  the  Muse's  teaching,  and  the 
pleasant  fingerer  of  his  pastoral  flute  among  the  reeds  of 
Eydal. 

Wordsworth  is  simply  a  Westmoreland  peasant,  with  con- 
siderably less  shrewdness  than  most  border  Englishmen  or 
Scotsmen  inherit  ;  and  no  sense  of  humour  :  but  gifted  (in 
this  singularly)  with  vivid  sense  of  natural  beauty,  and  a 
pretty  turn  for  reflections,  not  always  acute,  but.  as  far  as  they 
reach,  medicinal  to  the  fever  of  the  restless  and  corrupted 
life  around  him.  Water  to  parched  lips  may  be  better  than 
Samian  wine,  but  do  not  let  us  therefore  confuse  the  qualities 
of  wine  and  water.  I  much  doubt  there  being  many  in- 
glorious Miltons  in  our  country  churchyards  ;  but  I  am  very 
sure  there  are  many  Wordsworths  resting  there,  who  were  in- 
ferior to  the  renowned  one  only  in  caring  less  to  hear  them- 
selves talk. 

1  I  have  been  greatly  disappointed,  in  taking  soundings  of  our  most 
majestic  mountain  pools,  to  find  them,  in  no  case,  verge  on  the  un- 
fathomable. 


FICTION— FAIR  AND  FOUR 


197 


With  an  honest  and  kindly  heart,  a  stimulating  egoism,  a 
wholesome  contentment  in  modest  circumstances,  and  such 
sufficient  ease,  in  that  accepted  state,  as  permitted  the  passing 
of  a  good  deal  of  time  in  wishing  that  daisies  could  see  the 
beauty  of  their  own  shadows,  and  other  such  profitable 
mental  exercises,  Wordsworth  has  left  us  a  series  of  studies 
of  the  graceful  and  happy  shepherd  life  of  our  lake  country, 
which  to  me  personally,  for  one,  are  entirely  sweet  and  pre- 
cious ;  but  they  are  only  so  as  the  mirror  of  an  existent  reality 
in  many  ways  more  beautiful  than  its  picture. 

But  the  other  clay  I  went  for  an  afternoon's  rest  into  the 
cottage  of  one  of  our  country  people  of  old  statesman  class ; 
cottage  lying  nearly  midway  between  two  village  churches, 
but  more  conveniently  for  downhill  walk  towards  one  than 
the  other.  I  found,  as  the  good  housewife  made  tea  for  me, 
that  nevertheless  she  went  up  the  hill  to  church.  £  Why  do 
not  you  go  to  the  nearer  church  ? '  I  asked.  '  Don't  you  like 
the  clergyman  V  6  Oh  no,  sir,'  she  answered,  6  it  isn't  that  ; 
but  you  know  I  couldn't  leave  my  mother.'    '  Your  mother  ! 

she  is  buried  at  H         then  ? '    '  Yes,  sir  ;  and  you  know  I 

couldn't  go  to  church  anywhere  else.' 

That  feelings  such  as  these  existed  among  the  peasants,  not 
of  Cumberland  only,  but  of  all  the  tender  earth  that  gives 
forth  her  fruit  for  the  living,  and  receives  her  dead  to  peace, 
might  perhaps  have  been,  to  our  great  and  endless  comfort, 
discovered  before  now,  if  Wordsworth  had  been  content  to 
tell  us  what  he  knew  of  his  own  villages  and  people,  not  as 
the  leader  of  a  new  and  only  correct  school  of  poetry,  but 
simply  as  a  country  gentleman  of  sense  and  feeling,  fond  of 
primroses,  kind  to  the  parish  children,  and  reverent  of  the 
spade  with  which  Wilkinson  had  tilled  his  lands  :  and  I  am 
by  no  means  sure  that  his  influence  on  the  stronger  minds  of 
his  time  was  anywise  hastened  or  extended  by  the  spirit  of 
tunefulness  under  whose  guidance  he  discovered  that  heaven 
rhymed  to  seven,  and  Foy  to  boy. 

Tuneful  nevertheless  at  heart,  and  of  the  heavenly  choir,  I 
gladly  and  frankly  acknowledge  him  ;  and  our  English  litera- 
ture enriched  with  a  new  and  a  singular  virtue  in  the  aerial 


FICTION—FAIR  AND  FOUL. 


purity  and  healthful  Tightness  of  his  quiet  song ; — but  aerial 
only, — not  ethereal  ;  and  lowly  in  its  privacy  of  light. 

A  measured  mind,  and  calm  ;  innocent,  unrepentant ;  help- 
ful to  sinless  creatures  and  scatheless,  such  of  the  flock  as  do 
not  stray.  Hopeful  at  least,  if  not  faithful ;  content  with  in- 
timations of  immortality  such  as  may  be  in  skipping  of  lambs, 
and  laughter  of  children, — incurious  to  see  in  the  hands  the 
print  of  the  JSTails. 

A  gracious  and  constant  mind  ;  as  the  herbage  of  its  native 
hills,  fragrant  and  pure  ; — yet,  to  the  sweep  and  the  shadow, 
the  stress  and  distress,  of  the  greater  souls  of  men,  as  the 
tufted  thyme  to  the  laurel  wilderness  of  Tempe, — as  the 
gleaming  euphrasy  to  the  dark  branches  of  Dodona. 

[I  am  obliged  to  defer  the  main  body  of  this  paper  to  next 
month, — revises  penetrating  all  too  late  into  my  lacustrine 
seclusion  ;  as  chanced  also  unluckily  with  the  preceding  paper, 
in  which  the  reader  will  perhaps  kindly  correct  the  consequent 
misprints,  p.  29,  1.  20,  of  •  scarcely '  to  \  securely,'  and  p.  31, 
1.  34,  'full/  with  comma,  to  'fall,'  without  one  ;  noticing  be- 
sides that  Red  gauntlet  has  been  omitted  in  the  italicised 
list,  p.  25,  1.  16 ;  and  that  the  reference  to  note  2  should 
not  be  at  the  word  'imagination/  p.  24,  but  at  the  word 
'trade,'  p.  25,  1.  7.  My  clear  old  friend,  Dr.  John  Brown, 
sends  me,  from  Jamieson's  Dictionary,  the  following  satisfac- 
tory end  to  one  of  my  difficulties  : — £  Coup  the  crans.'  The 
language  is  borrowed  from  the  '  cran,'  or  trivet  on  which 
small  pots  are  placed  in  cookery,  which  is  sometimes  turned 
with  its  feet  uppermost  by  an  awkward  assistant,  Thus  it 
signifies  to  be  completely  upset.] 

John  Euskin. 

[Byron.] 

*  Parching  summer  hath  no  warrant 

To  consume  this  crystal  well ; 
Rains,  that  make  each  brook  a  torrent, 
Neither  sully  it,  nor  swell. ' 


So  was  it,  year  by  year,  among  the  unthought-of  hills.  Lit- 
tle Duddon  and  child  Botha  ran  clear  and  glad  ;  and  laughed 


FICTION— FAIll  AND  FOUL. 


199 


from  ledge  to  pool,  and  opened  from  pool  to  mere,  translucent, 
through  endless  days  of  peace. 

But  eastward,  between  her  orchard  plains,  Loire  locked  her 
embracing  dead  in  silent  sands  ;  dark  with  blood  rolled  Iser  ; 
glacial-pale,  Beresina-Lethe,  by  whose  shore  the  weary  hearts 
forgot  their  people,  and  their  father's  house. 

Nor  unsullied,  Tiber  ;  nor  unsworn,  Arno  and  AuMus  ;  and 
Euroclydon  high  on  Heiie's  wave ;  meantime,  let  our  happy 
piety  glorify  the  garden  rocks  with  snowdrop  circlet,  and 
breathe  the  spirit  of  Paradise,  where  life  is  wise  and  innocent. 

Maps  many  have  wre,  now-a-days  clear  in  display  of  earth 
constituent,  air  current,  and  ocean  tide.  Shall  we  ever  en- 
grave the  map  of  meaner  research,  whose  shadings  shall  con- 
tent themselves  in  the  task  of  showing  the  depth,  or  drought, 
— the  calm,  or  trouble,  of  Human  Compassion  ? 

For  this  is  indeed  all  that  is  noble  in  the  life  of  Man,  and 
the  source  of  all  that  is  noble  in  the  speech  of  Man.  Had  it 
narrowed  itself  then,  in  those  days,  out  of  all  the  world,  into 
this  peninsula  between  Cockermouth  and  Shap  ? 

Not  altogether  so  ;  but  indeed  the  Vocal  piety  seemed  con- 
clusively to  have  retired  (or  excursed  ?)  into  that  mossy  her- 
mitage, above  Little  Langdale.  The  £7?ivocal  piety,  with  the 
uncomplaining  sorrow,  of  Man,  may  have  had  a  somewhat 
wider  range,  for  aught  we  know  :  but  history  disregards  those 
items  ;  and  of  firmly  proclaimed  and  swreetly  canorous  religion, 
there  really  seemed  at  that  juncture  none  to  be  reckoned  upon, 
east  of  Ingleborough,  or  north  of  Criffel.  Only  under  Furness 
Fells,  or  by  Bolton  Priory,  it  seems  we  can  still  write  Ecclesi- 
astical Sonnets,  stanzas  on  the  force  of  Prayer,  Odes  to  Duty, 
and  complimentary  addresses  to  the  Deity  upon  His  endurance 
for  adoration.  Far  otherwise,  over  yonder,  by  Spezzia  Bay, 
and  Ravenna  Pineta,  and  in  ravines  of  Hartz.  There,  the 
softest  voices  speak  the  wildest  words  ;  and  Keats  discourses 
of  Endymion,  Shelley  of  Demogorgon,  Goethe  of  Lucifer,  and 
Burger  of  the  Besurrection  of  Death  unto  Death — while  even 
Puritan  Scotland  and  Episcopal  Anglia  produce  for  us  only 
these  three  minstrels  of  doubtful  tone,  who  show  but  small 
respect  for  the  *  unco  guid,'  put  but  limited  faith  in  gifted 


200 


FICTION— FAIR  AND  FOUL. 


Gtelfillan,  and  translate  with  unflinching  frankness  the  Mor+ 

gante  Maggiore.1 

Dismal  the  aspect  of  the  spiritual  world,  or  at  least  the 
sound  of  it,  might  well  seem  to  the  eyes  and  ears  of  Saints 
(such  as  we  had)  of  the  period — dismal  in  angels'  eyes  also  assur- 
edly !  Yet  is  it  possible  that  the  dismalness  in  angelic  sight 
may  be  otherwise  quartered,  as  it  were,  from  the  way  of  mor- 
tal heraldry  ;  and  that  seen,  and  heard,  of  angels, — again  I  say 
— hesitatingly — is  it  possible  that  the  goodness  of  the  Unco 
Guid,  and  the  gift  of  Gilfillan,  and  the  word  of  Mr.  Blatter- 
gowl,  may  severally  not  have  been  the  goodness  of  God,  the  gift 
of  God,  nor  the  word  of  God  :  but  that  in  the  much  blotted 
and  broken  efforts  at  goodness,  and  in  the  careless  gift  which 
they  themselves  despised,2  and  in  the  sweet  ryme  and  murmur 
of  their  unpurposed  words,  the  Spirit  of  the  Lord  had,  indeed, 
wandering,  as  in  chaos  days  on  lightless  waters,  gone  forth 
in  the  hearts  and  from  the  lips  of  those  other  three  strange 
prophets,  even  though  they  ate  forbidden  bread  by  the  altar 
of  the  poured-out  ashes,  and  even  though  the  wild  beast  of  the 
desert  found  them,  and  slew. 

This,  at  least,  I  know,  that  it  had  been  well  for  England, 
though  all  her  other  prophets,  of  the  Press,  the  Parliament, 
the  Doctor's  chair,  and  the  Bishop's  throne,  had  fallen  silent ; 
so  only  that  she  had  been  able  to  understand  with  her  heart 
here  and  there  the  simplest  line  of  these,  her  despised. 

1  '  It  must  be  put  by  the  original,  stanza  for  stanza,  and  verse  for 
verse  ;  and  you  will  see  what  was  permitted  in  a  Catholic  country  and  a 
bigoted  age  to  Churchmen,  on  the  score  of  Religion — and  so  tell  those 
buffoons  who  accuse  me  of  attacking  the  Liturgy. 

' 1  write  in  the  greatest  haste,  it  being  the  hour  of  the  Corso,  and  I 
must  go  and  buffoon  with  the  rest.  My  daughter  Allegra  is  just  gone 
with  the  Countess  G.  in  Count  G.'s  coach  and  six.  Our  old  Cardinal  is 
dead,  and  the  new  one  not  appointed  yet— but  the  masquing  goes  on  the 
same.'  (Letter  to  Murray,  355th  in  Moore,  dated  Ravenna,  Feb.  7, 
1828.)  '  A  dreadfully  moral  place,  for  you  must  not  look  at  anybody's 
wife,  except  your  neighbour's.' 

2  See  quoted  infra  the  mock,  by  Byron,  of  himself  and  all  other  mod- 
ern poets,  Juan,  canto  iii.  stanza  86,  and  compare  canto  xiv.  stanza  8. 
In  reference  of  future  quotations  the  first  numeral  will  stand  always  foi 
canto  ;  the  second  for  stanza  ;  the  third,  if  necessary,  for  line. 


FICTION— FAIR  AND  FOUL. 


201 


I  take  one  at  mere  chance  : 

1  Who  thinks  of  self,  when  gazing  on  the  sky  ?  ' 1 

Well,  I  don't  know ;  Mr.  Wordsworth  certainly  did,  and 
observed,  with  truth,  that  its  clouds  took  a  sober  colouring 
in  consequence  of  his  experiences.  It  is  much  if,  indeed,  this 
sadness  be  unselfish,  and  our  eyes  have  kept  loving  watch  o'er 
Man's  Mortality.  I  have  found  it  difficult  to  make  any  one 
now-a-days  believe  that  such  sobriety  can  be  ;  and  that  Tur- 
ner saw  deeper  crimson  than  others  in  the  clouds  of  Goldau. 
But  that  any  should  yet  think  the  clouds  brightened  by  Man's 
immortality  instead  of  dulled  by  his  death, — and,  gazing  on 
the  sky,  look  for  the  day  when  every  eye  must  gaze  also — for 
behold,  He  cometh  with  the  clouds — this  it  is  no  more  possi- 
ble for  Christian  England  to  apprehend,  however  exhorted  by 
her  gifted  and  guid. 

c  But  Byron  was  not  thinking  of  such  things  ! ' — He,  the 
reprobate  !  how  should  such  as  he  think  of  Christ  ? 

Perhaps  not  wholly  as  you  or  I  think  of  Him.  Take,  at 
chance,  another  line  or  two,  to  try : 

'  Carnage  (so  Wordsworth  tells  yon)  is  God's  daughter ; 2 
If  he  speak  truth,  she  is  Christ's  sister,  and 
Just  now,  behaved  as  in  the  Holy  Land.' 

Blasphemy,  cry  you,  good  reader  ?  Are  you  sure  you  under- 
stand it?  The  first  line  I  gave  you  was  easy  Byron— almost 
shallow  Byron — these  are  of  the  man  in  his  depth,  and  you 
will  not  fathom  them,  like  a  tarn, — nor  in  a  hurry. 

'Just  now  behaved  as  in  the  Holy  Land.'  How  did  Car- 
nage behave  in  the  Holy  Land  then?  You  have  all  been 
greatly  questioning,  of  late,  whether  the  sun,  which  you  find 
to  be  now  going  out,  ever  stood  still.  Did  you  in  any  lagging- 
minute,  on  those  scientific  occasions,  chance  to  reflect  what  he 

1  Island,  ii.  16,  where  see  context. 

2  Juan,  viii.  5 ;  but,  by  your  Lordship's  quotation,  Wordsworth  says 
*  instrument '—not  '  daughter.'  Your  Lordship  had  better  have  said 
'Infant'  and  taken  the  Woolwich  authorities  to  witness:  only  Infant 
would  not  have  rynied. 


202 


FICTION— FAIR  AND  FOUL. 


was  bid  stand  still  for?  or  if  not — will  you  please  look — and 
what,  also,  going  forth  again  as  a  strong  man  to  run  his  course, 
he  saw,  rejoicing  ? 

'  Then  Joshua  passed  from  Makkedah  unto  Libnah — and 
fought  against  Libnah.  And  the  Lord  delivered  it  and  the 
king  thereof  into  the  hand  of  Israel,  and  he  smote  it  with  the 
edge  of  the  sword,  and  all  the  souls  that  were  therein.'  And 
from  Lachish  to  Eglon,  and  from  Eglon  to  Kirjath-Arba,  and 
Sarah's  grave  in  the  Amorites'  land,  c  and  Joshua  smote  all  the 
country  of  the  hills  and  of  the  south — and  of  the  vale  and  of 
the  springs,  and  all  their  kings  ;  he  left  none  remaining,  but 
utterly  destroyed  all  that  breathed — as  the  Lord  God  of  Israel 
commanded.' 

Thus  { it  is  written  : '  though  you  perhaps  do  not  so  often 
hear  these  texts  preached  from,  as  certain  others  about  taking 
away  the  sins  of  the  world.  I  wonder  how  the  world  would 
like  to  part  with  them  !  hitherto  it  has  always  preferred  part- 
ing first  with  its  Life — and  God  has  taken  it  at  its  word. 
But  Death  is  not  His  Begotten  Son,  for  all  that ;  nor  is  the 
death  of  the  innocent  in  battle  carnage  His  '  instrument  for 
working  out  a  pure  intent '  as  Mr.  Wordsworth  puts  it  ;  but 
Man's  instrument  for  working  out  an  impure  one,  as  Byron 
would  have  you  to  know.  Theology  perhaps  less  orthodox, 
but  certainly  more  reverent ; — neither  is  the  Woolwich  Infant 
a  Child  of  God  ;  neither  does  the  iron-clad  '  Thunderer  '  utter 
thunders  of  God — which  facts,  if  you  had  had  the  grace  or 
sense  to  learn  from  Byron,  instead  of  accusing  him  of  blas- 
phemy, it  had  been  better  at  this  day  for  you,  and  for  many 
a  savage  soul  also,  by  Euxine  shore,  and  in  Zulu  and  Afghan 
lands. 

It  was  neither,  however,  for  the  theology,  nor  the  use,  of 
these  lines  that  I  quoted  them  ;  but  to  note  this  main  point 
of  Byron's  own  character.  He  was  the  first  great  Englishman 
who  felt  the  cruelty  of  war,  and,  in  its  cruelty,  the  shame. 
Its  guilt  had  been  known  to  George  Fox — its  folly  shown 
practically  by  Penn.  But  the  compassion  of  the  pious  world 
had  still  for  the  most  part  been  shown  only  in  keeping  its 
stock  of  Barabbases  unhanged  if  possible  :  and,  till  Byron 


FICTION—FAIR  AND  FOUL. 


203 


came,  neither  Kunersdorf,  Eylau,  nor  Waterloo,  had  taught 
the  pity  and  the  pride  of  men  that 

*  The  drying  up  a  single  tear  has  more 
Of  honest  fame  than  shedding  seas  of  gore.'  1 

Such  pacific  verse  would  not  indeed  have  been  acceptable  to 
the  Edinburgh  volunteers  on  Portobello  sands.  But  Byron 
can  write  a  battle  song  too,  when  it  is  his  cue  to  fight.  If 
you  look  at  the  introduction  to  the  Isles  of  Greece,  namely  the 
8oth  and  86th  stanzas  of  the  3rd  canto  of  Don  Juan, — you 
will  find — what  will  you  not  find,  if  only  you  understand 
them  !  '  He  '  in  the  first  line,  remember,  means  the  typical 
modern  poet. 

'  Thus  usually,  when  he  was  asked  to  sing, 

He  gave  the  different  nations  something  national. 

'Twas  all  the  same  to  him — •'  God  save  the  King  " 
Or  "  Qa  ira"  according  to  the  fashion  all  ; 

His  muse  made  increment  of  anything 

From  the  high  lyric  down  to  the  low  rational : 

If  Pindar  sang  horse-races,  what  should  hinder 

Himself  from  being  as  pliable  as  Pindar  ? 

'In  France,  for  instance,  he  would  write  a  chanson  ; 

In  England  a  six-canto  quarto  tale  ; 
In  Spain,  he  d  make  a  ballad  or  romance  on 

The  last  war—  much  the  same  in  Portugal  ; 
In  Germany,  the  Pegasus  he'd  prance  on 

Would  be  old  Goethe's — (see  what  says  de  Stael) 
In  Italy  he  d  ape  the  '  Trecentisti 
In  Greece,  he'd  sing  some  sort  of  hymn  like  this  t*  ye. 

Note  first  here,  as  we  did  in  Scott,  the  concentrating  and 
foretelling  power.  The  <  God  Save  the  Queen  '  in  England, 
fallen  hollow  now,  as  the  '  Qa  ira '  in  France— not  a  man  in 

1  Juan,  viii.  3;  compare  14  and  63,  with  all  its  lovely  context  GI- 
GS :  then  82,  and  afterwards  slowly  and  with  thorough  attention,  the 
Devil's  speech,  beginning,  '  Yes,  Sir,  you  forget '  in  scene  2  of  The  De- 
formed Transformed  :  then  Sardanapalus's,  act  i.  scene  2,  beginning  '  he 
is  gone,  and  on  his  finger  bears  my  signet,'  and  finally,  the  Vision  oj 
Judgment,  stanzas  3  to  5. 


204 


FICTION—FAIR  AND  FOUL. 


France  knowing  where  either  France  or  *  that '  (whatevei 
'  that '  may  be)  is  going  to  ;  nor  the  Queen  of  England  dar- 
ing, for  her  life,  to  ask  the  tiniest  Englishman  to  do  a  single 
thing  he  doesn't  like  ; — nor  any  salvation,  either  of  Queen  or 
Kealm,  being  any  more  possible  to  God,  unless  under  the 
direction  of  the  Royal  Society  :  then,  note  the  estimate  of 
height  and  depth  in  poetry,  swept  in  an  instant,  '  high  lyric 
to  low  rational.'  Pindar  to  Pope  (knowing  Pope's  height,  too, 
all  the  while,  no  man  better)  ;  then,  the  poetic  power  of 
France — resumed  in  a  word — Beranger ;  then  the  cut  at 
Marmion,  entirely  deserved,  as  we  shall  see,  yet  kindly  given, 
for  everything  he  names  in  these  two  stanzas  is  the  best  of  its 
kind  ;  then  Romance  in  Spain  on — the  last  war,  (present  war 
not  being  to  Spanish  poetical  taste),  then,  Goethe  the  real 
heart  of  all  Germany,  and  last,  the  aping  of  the  Trecentisti 
which  has  since  consummated  itself  in  Pre-Raphaelitism  ! 
that  also  being  the  best  thing  Italy  has  done  through  Eng- 
land, whether  in  Rossetti's  £  blessed  damozels '  or  Burne 
Jones's  '  days  of  creation.'  Lastly  comes  the  mock  at  himself 
— the  modern  English  Greek — (followed  up  by  the  'degener- 
ate into  hands  like  mine '  in  the  song  itself)  ;  and  then — to 
amazement,  forth  he  thunders  in  his  Achilles  voice.  We 
have  had  one  line  of  him  in  his  clearness — five  of  him  in  his 
depth — sixteen  of  him  in  his  play.  Hear  now  but  these,  out 
of  his  whole  heart : — 

'  What,  — silent  yet  ?  and  silent  all? 
Ah  no,  the  voices  of  the  dead 
Sound  like  a  distant  torrent's  fall, 

And  answer,  "  Let  one  living  head, 
But  one,  arise — we  corne — we  come  :  M 
— 'Tis  but  the  living  who  are  dumb.' 

Resurrection,  this,  you  see  like  Burger's  ;  but  not  of  death 
unto  death. 

*  Sound  like  a  distant  torrent's  fall.'  I  said  the  whole  heart 
of  Byron  was  in  this  passage.  First  its  compassion,  then  its 
indignation,  and  the  third  element,  not  yet  examined,  that 
love  of  the  beauty  of  this  world  in  which  the  three — unholy 


FICTION— FAIR  AND  FOUL. 


205 


— children,  of  its  Fiery  Furnace  were  like  to  each  other  ;  but 
Byron  the  widest-hearted.  Scott  and  Burns  love  Scotland 
more  than  Nature  itself  :  for  Bums  the  moon  must  rise  over 
Cumnock  Hills, — for  Scott,  the  Rymer's  glen  divide  the 
Eildons ;  but,  for  Byron,  Loch-na-Gar  with  Ida,  looks  o'er 
Troy,  and  the  soft  murmurs  of  the  Dee  and  the  Bruar  change 
into  voices  of  the  dead  on  distant  Marathon. 

Yet  take  the  parallel  from  Scott,  by  a  field  of  homelier 
rest : — 

'  And  silence  aids — though  the  steep  hills 
Send  to  the  lake  a  thousand  rills ; 
In  summer  tide,  so  soft  they  weep, 
The  sound  but  lulls  the  ear  asleep  ; 
Your  horse's  hoof -tread  sounds  too  rude, 
So  stilly  is  the  solitude. 

Naught  living  meets  the  eye  or  ear, 
But  well  I  ween  the  dead  are  near  ; 
For  though,  in  feudal  strife,  a  foe 
Hath  laid  our  Lady's  Chapel  low, 
Yet  still  beneath  the  hallowed  soil, 
The  peasant  rests  him  from  his  toil, 
And,  dying,  bids  his  bones  be  laid 
Where  erst  his  simple  fathers  prayed.' 

And  last  take  the  same  note  of  sorrow — with  Burns's  finger 
on  the  fall  of  it : 

4  Mourn,  ilka  grove  the  cushat  kens, 
Ye  hazly  shaws  and  briery  dens, 
Ye  burnies,  wimplin'  down  your  glens 

Wi'  toddlin'  din, 
Or  foamm'  Strang  wi'  hasty  stens 

Frae  lin  to  lin.' 

As  you  read,  one  after  another,  these  fragments  of  chant  by 
the  great  masters,  does  not  a  sense  come  upon  you  of  some 
element  in  their  passion,  no  less  than  in  their  sound,  different, 
specifically,  from  that  of  'Parching  summer  hath  no  warrant'? 
Is  it  more  profane,  think  you— or  more  tender-— nay,  perhaps, 
in  the  core  of  it,  more  true  ? 


206 


FICTION— FAIR  AND  FOUL. 


For  instance,  when  we  are  told  that 

*  Wharfe,  as  he  moved  along, 
To  matins  joined  a  mournful  voice,' 

is  this  disposition  of  the  river's  mind  to  pensive  psalmody 
quite  logically  accounted  for  by  the  previous  statement 
(itself  by  no  means  rhythmically  dulcet,)  that 

*  The  boy  is  in  the  arms  of  Wharfe, 
And  strangled  by  a  merciless  force  '  ? 

Or,  when  we  are  led  into  the  improving  reflection, 

4  How  sweet  were  leisure,  could  it  yield  no  more 
Then  'mid  this  wave- washed  churchyard  to  recline, 
From  pastoral  graves  extracting  thoughts  divine  !  ' 

— is  the  divinity  of  the  extract  assured  to  us  by  its  being 
made  at  leisure,  and  in  a  reclining  attitude — as  compared 
with  the  meditations  of  otherwise  active  men,  in  an  erect  one  ? 
Or  are  we  perchance,  many  of  us,  still  erring  somewhat  in 
our  notions  alike  of  Divinity  and  Humanity, — poetical  ex- 
traction, and  moral  position  ? 

On  the  chance  of  its  being  so,  might  I  ask  hearing  for  just 
a  few  words  more  of  the  school  of  Belial  ? 

Their  occasion,  it  must  be  confessed,  is  a  quite  unjustifiable 
one.  Some  very  wicked  people — mutineers,  in  fact — have 
retired,  misanthropically,  into  an  unfrequented  part  of  the 
country,  and  there  find  themselves  safe,  indeed,  but  extremely 
thirsty.    Whereupon  Byron  thus  gives  them  to  drink  : 

1  A  little  stream  came  tumbling  from  the  height 
And  straggling  into  ocean  as  it  might. 
Its  bounding  crystal  frolicked  in  the  ray 
And  gushed  from  cliff  to  crag  with  saltless  spray, 
Close  on  the  wild  wide  ocean, — yet  as  pure 
And  fresh  as  Innocence  ;  and  more  secure. 
Its  silver  torrent  glittered  o'er  the  deep 
As  the  shy  chamois'  eye  overlooks  the  steep, 
While,  far  below,  the  vast  and  sullen  swell 
Of  ocean's  Alpine  azure  rose  and  fell.  \ 1 
■  Island,  iii.  3,  and  compare,  of  shore  surf,  the  'slings  its  high  flakes* 
shivered  into  sleet '  of  stanza  7. 


FICTION— FAIR  AND  FOUL. 


207 


Now,  I  beg,  with  such  authority  as  an  old  workman  may  take 
concerning  his  trade,  having  also  looked  at  a  waterfall  or  two 
in  my  time,  and  not  unfrequently  at  a  wave,  to  assure  the 
reader  that  here  is  entirely  first-rate  literary  work.  Though 
Lucifer  himself  had  written  it,  the  thing  is  itself  good,  and 
not  only  so,  but  unsurpassably  good,  the  closing  line  being 
probably  the  best  concerning  the  sea  yet  written  by  the  race 
of  the  sea-kings. 

But  Lucifer  himself  could  not  have  written  it ;  neither  any 
servant  of  Lucifer.  I  do  not  doubt  but  that  most  readers 
were  surprised  at  my  saying,  in  the  close  of  my  first  paper, 
that  Byron's  '  style '  depended  in  any  wise  on  his  views  re- 
specting the  Ten  Commandments.  That  so  all-important  a 
thing  as  ' style'  should  depend  in  the  least  upon  so  ri- 
diculous a  thing  as  moral  sense  :  or  that  Allegra's  father, 
watching  her  drive  by  in  Count  G.'s  coach  and  six,  had  any 
remnant  of  so  ridiculous  a  thing  to  guide, — or  check, — his 
poetical  passion,  may  alike  seem  more  than  questionable  to 
the  liberal  and  chaste  philosophy  of  the  existing  British 
public.  But,  first  of  all,  putting  the  question  of  who  writes, 
or  speaks,  aside,  do  you,  good  reader,  know  good  c  style  ' 
when  you  get  it  ?  Can  you  say,  of  half-a-dozen  given  lines 
taken  anywhere  out  of  a  novel,  or  poem,  or  play,  That  is 
good,  essentially,  in  style,  or  bad,  essentially?  and  can  you 
say  why  such  half-dozen  lines  are  good,  or  bad? 

I  imagine  that  in  most  cases,  the  reply  would  be  given  with 
hesitation,  yet  if  you  will  give  me  a  little  patience,  and  take 
some  accurate  pains,  I  can  show  you  the  main  tests  of  style  in 
the  space  of  a  couple  of  pages. 

I  take  two  examples  of  absolutely  perfect,  and  in  manner 
highest,  i.  e.  kingly,  and  heroic,  style  :  the  first  example  in 
expression  of  anger,  the  second  of  love. 

(1)  1  We  are  glad  the  Dauphin  is  so  pleasant  with  us, 
His  present,  and  your  pains,  we  thank  you  for, 
When  we  have  match'd  our  rackets  to  these  balls, 
We  will  in  France,  by  God  s  grace,  play  a  Bet, 
►Shall  fetiike  his  father's  crown  into  (lie  hazard.* 


208 


FICTION— FAIR  AND  FOUL. 


(2)  '  My  gracious  Silence,  hail ! 

Would'st  thou  have  laughed,  had  I  come  coffin'd  home 
That  weep'st  to  see  me  triumph  ?    Ah,  my  dear, 
Such  eyes  the  widows  in  Corioli  wear, 
And  mothers  that  lack  sons. 7 

Let  us  note,  point  by  point,  the  conditions  of  greatness 
common  to  both  these  passages,  so  opposite  in  temper. 

A.  Absolute  command  over  all  passion,  however  intense  ; 
this  the  first-of -first  conditions,  (see  the  King's  own  sentence 
just  before,  '  We  are  no  tyrant,  but  a  Christian  King,  Unto 
whose  grace  our  passion  is  as  subject  As  are  our  wretches 
fettered  in  our  prisons') ;  and  with  this  self-command,  the 
supremely  surveying  grasp  of  every  thought  that  is  to  be  ut- 
tered, before  its  utterance  ;  so  that  each  may  come  in  its 
exact  place,  time,  and  connection.  The  slightest  hurry,  the 
misplacing  of  a  word,  or  the  unnecessary  accent  on  a  syllable, 
would  destroy  the  '  style '  in  an  instant. 

B.  Choice  of  the  fewest  and  simplest  words  that  can  be 
found  in  the  compass  of  the  language,  to  express  the  thing 
meant :  these  few  words  being  also  arranged  in  the  most 
straightforward  and  intelligible  way  ;  allowing  inversion  only 
when  the  subject  can  be  made  primary  without  obscurity : 
(thus,  '  his  present,  and  your  pains,  we  thank  you  for '  is  bet- 
ter than  '  we  thank  you  for  his  present  and  your  pains/ 
because  the  Dauphin's  gift  is  by  courtesy  put  before  the  Am- 
bassador s  pains  ;  but  '  when  to  these  balls  our  rackets  we  have 
matched '  would  have  spoiled  the  style  in  a  moment,  because — 
I  was  going  to  have  said,  ball  and  racket  are  of  equal  rank, 
and  therefore  only  the  natural  order  proper ;  but  also  here 
the  natural  order  is  the  desired  one,  the  English  racket  to 
have  precedence  of  the  French  ball.  In  the  fourth  line  the 
6  in  France '  comes  first,  as  announcing  the  most  important 
resolution  of  action  ;  the  '  by  God's  grace  '  next,  as  the  only 
condition  rendering  resolution  possible  ;  the  detail  of  issue 
follows  with  the  strictest  limit  in  the  final  word.  The  King 
does  not  say  '  danger,'  far  less  6  dishonour/  but  '  hazard  '  only ; 
of  that  he  is,  humanly  speaking,  sure. 

C.  Perfectly  emphatic  and  clear  utterance  of  the  chosen 


FICTION— FAIR  AND  FOUL. 


209 


words ;  slowly  in  the  degree  of  their  importance,  with  omis- 
sion however  of  every  word  not  absolutely  required  ;  and 
natural  use  of  the  familiar  contractions  of  final  dissyllable. 
Thus,  ' play  a  set  shall  strike  ■  is  better  than  '  play  a  set  that 
shall  strike,'  and  'match'd'  is  kingly  short — no  necessity  could 
have  excused  !  matched '  instead.  On  the  contrary,  the  three 
first  words,  '  We  are  glad/  would  have  been  spoken  by  the 
king  more  slowly  and  fully  than  any  other  syllables  in  the 
whole  passage,  first  pronouncing  the  kingly  '  we  '  at  its  proud- 
est, and  then  the  6  are  '  as  a  continuous  state,  and  then  the 
'  glad,'  as  the  exact  contrary  of  what  the  ambassadors  ex- 
pected him  to  be.1 

D.  Absolute  spontaneity  in  doing  all  this,  easily  and  neces- 
sarily as  the  heart  beats.  The  king  cannot  speak  otherwise 
than  he  does — nor  the  hero.  The  words  not  merely  come  to 
them,  but  are  compelled  to  them.  Even  lisping  numbers 
1  come,'  but  mighty  numbers  are  ordained,  and  inspired. 

E.  Melody  in  the  words,  changeable  with  their  passion 
fitted  to  it  exactly  and  the  utmost  of  which  the  language  is 
capable — the  melody  in  prose  being  Eolian  and  variable — in 
verse,  nobler  by  submitting  itself  to  stricter  law.  I  will 
enlarge  upon  this  point  presently. 

F.  Utmost  spiritual  contents  in  the  words  ;  so  that  each 
carries  not  only  its  instant  meaning,  but  a  cloudy  companion- 
ship of  higher  or  darker  meaning  according  to  the  passion 
— nearly  always  indicated  by  metaphor  :  '  play  a  set ' — some- 
times by  abstraction — (thus  in  the  second  passage  '  silence  ' 
for  silent  one)  sometimes  by  description  instead  of  direct  epi- 
thet ('  coffined '  for  dead)  but  always  indicative  of  there  being- 
more  in  the  speaker's  mind  than  he  has  said,  or  than  he  can 
say,  full  though  his  saying  be.  On  the  quantity  of  this 
attendant  fulness  depends  the  majesty  of  style  ;  that  is  to 

1  A  modern  editor — of  whom  I  will  not  use  the  expressions  which 
occur  to  me — finding  the  '  we  '  a  redundant  syllable  in  the  iambic  line, 
prints  'we're/  It  is  a  little  thing — but  I  do  not  recollect,  in  the  forty 
years  of  my  literary  experience,  any  piece  of  editor's  retouch  quite  so 
base.  But  I  don't  read  the  new  editions  much  ;  that  must  be  allowed 
for. 


210 


FICTION— FAIR  AND  FOUL. 


say,  virtually,  on  the  quantity  of  contained  thought  in  briefest 
words,  such  thought  being  primarily  loving  and  true  :  and 
this  the  sum  of  all — that  nothing  can  be  well  said,  but  with 
truth,  nor  beautifully,  but  by  love. 

These  are  the  essential  conditions  of  noble  speech  in  prose 
and  verse  alike,  but  the  adoption  of  the  form  of  verse,  and 
especially  rymed  verse,  means  the  addition  to  all  these  quali- 
ties of  one  more  ;  of  music,  that  i3  to  say,  not  Eolian  merely, 
but  Apolline  ;  a  construction  or  architecture  of  words  fitted 
and  befitting,  under  external  laws  of  time  and  harmony. 

When  Byron  says  '  rhyme  is  of  the  rude/  1  he  means  that 
Burns  needs  it, — while  Henry  the  Fifth  does  not,  nor  Plato, 
nor  Isaiah — yet  in  this  need  of  it  by  the  simple,  it  becomes  all 
the  more  religious  :  and  thus  the  loveliest  pieces  of  Christian 
language  are  all  in  ryme — the  best  of  Dante,  Chaucer,  Doug- 
las, Shakespeare,  Spenser,  and  Sidney. 

I  am  not  now  able  to  keep  abreast  with  the  tide  of  modern 
scholarship  ;  (nor,  to  say  the  truth,  do  I  make  the  effort,  the 

1  Island,  ii.  5.  I  was  going  to  say,  *  Look  to  the  context,'  but  am  fain 
to  give  it  here ;  for  the  stanza,  learned  by  heart,  ought  to  be  our  school- 
introduction  to  the  literature  of  the  world. 

*  Such  was  this  ditty  of  Tradition's  days, 
Which  to  the  dead  a  lingering  fame  conveys 
In  song,  where  fame  as  yet  hath  left  no  sign 
Beyond  the  sound  whose  charm  is  half  divine  ; 
Which  leaves  no  record  to  the  sceptic  eye, 
But  yields  young  history  all  to  harmony  ; 
A  boy  Achilles,  with  the  centaur's  lyre 
In  hand,  to  teach  him  to  surpass  his  sire. 
For  one  long-cherish'd  ballad's  simple  stave 
Bung  from  the  rock,  or  mingled  with  the  wave, 
Or  from  the  bubbling  streamlet's  grassy  side, 
Or  gathering  mountain  echoes  as  they  glide, 
Hath  greater  power  o'er  each  true  heart  and  ear. 
Than  all  the  columns  Conquert's  minions  rear  ; 
Invites,  when  hieroglyphics  are  a  theme 
For  sages'  labours  or  the  student's  dream ; 
Attracts,  when  History's  volumes  are  a  toil — 
The  first,  the  freshest  bud  of  Feeling's  soil. 
Such  was  this  rude  rhyme — rhyme  is  of  the  rude, 
But  such  inspired  the  Norseman's  solitude, 
Who  came  and  conquer  d  ;  such,  wherever  rise 
Lands  which  no  foes  destroy  or  civilise, 
Exist ;  and  what  can  our  accomplish'd  art 
Of  verse  do  more  than  reach  the  awakenM  heart  ? 5 


FICTION-FAIR  AND  FOUL. 


211 


first  edge  of  its  waves  being  mostly  muddy,  and  apt  to  make 
a  shallow  sweep  of  the  shore  refuse  :)  so  that  I  have  no  better 
book  of  reference  by  me  than  the  confused  essay  on  the  an- 
tiquity of  ryme  at  the  end  of  Turner  s  Anglo-Saxons.  I  cannot 
however  conceive  a  more  interesting  piece  of  work,  if  not  yet 
done,  than  the  collection  of  sifted  earliest  fragments  known 
of  rymed  song  in  European  languages.  Of  Eastern  I  know 
nothing  ;  but,  this  side  Hellespont,  the  substance  of  the  mat- 
ter is  all  given  in  King  Canute's  impromptu 

1  Gaily  (or  is  it  sweetly  ? — I  forget  which,  and  it's  no  matter)  sang  the 

monks  of  Ely, 
As  Knut  the  king  came  sailing  l>y ;  ' 

much  to  be  noted  by  any  who  make  their  religion  lugubrious, 
and  their  Sunday  the  eclipse  of  the  wTeek.  And  observe  fur- 
ther, that  if  Milton  does  not  ryme,  it  is  because  his  faculty  of 
Song  was  concerning  Loss,  chiefly  ;  and  he  has  little  more 
than  faculty  of  Croak,  concerning  Gain  ;  while  Dante,  though 
modern  readers  never  go  further  with  him  than  into  the  Pit, 
is  stayed  only  by  Casella  in  the  ascent  to  the  Rose  of  Heaven. 
So,  Gibbon  can  write  in  his  manner  the  Fall  of  Rome  ;  but 
Virgil,  in  his  manner,  the  rise  of  it ;  and  finally  Douglas,  in 
his  manner,  bursts  into  such  rymed  passion  of  praise  both  of 
Rome  and  Virgil,  as  befits  a  Christian  Bishop,  and  a  good  sub- 
ject of  the  Holy  See. 

'  Master  of  Masters — sweet  source,  and  springing  well, 
Wide  where  over  all  ringes  thy  heavenly  bell  ; 

Why  should  I  then  with  dull  forehead  and  vain, 

With  rude  ingene,  and  barane,  emptive  brain, 

With  bad  harsh  speech,  and  lewit  barbare  tongue 

Presume  to  write,  where  thy  sweet  bell  is  rung, 

Or  counterfeit  thy  precious  wordis  dear? 

Ea.  na— not  so  ;  but  kneel  when  I  them  hear. 

But  farther  more — and  lower  to  descend 

Forgive  me,  Virgil,  if  I  thee  offend 

Pardon  thy  scolar,  suffer  him  to  ryme 

Since  thou  wast  but  ane  mortal  man  sometime,1 


212 


FICTION— FAIR  AND  FOUL. 


'  Before  honour  is  humility.'  Does  not  clearer  light  come 
for  you  on  that  law  after  reading  these  nobly  pious  words  ? 
And  note  you  ivhose  humility  ?  How  is  it  that  the  sound  of 
the  bell  comes  so  instinctively  into  his  chiming  verse  ?  This 
gentle  singer  is  the  son  of — Archibald  Bell-the-Cat ! 

And  now  perhaps  you  can  read  with  right  sympathy  the 
scene  in  Marmion  between  his  father  and  King  James. 

•  His  hand  the  monarch  sudden  took— 
Now,  by  the  Bruce's  soul, 
Angus,  my  hasty  speech  forgive, 
For  sure  as  doth  his  spirit  live 
As  he  said  of  the  Douglas  old 
I  well  may  say  of  you, — 
That  never  king  did  subject  hold. 
In  speech  more  free,  in  war  more  bold, 
More  tender  and  more  true : 
And  while  the  king  his  hand  did  strain 
The  old  man's  tears  fell  down  like  rain.' 

I  believe  the  most  infidel  of  scholastic  readers  can  scarcely 
but  perceive  the  relation  between  the  sweetness,  simplicity, 
and  melody  of  expression  in  these  passages,  and  the  gentle- 
ness of  the  passions  they  express,  while  men  who  are  not 
scholastic,  and  yet  are  true  scholars,  will  recognise  further  in 
them  that  the  simplicity  of  the  educated  is  lovelier  than  the 
simplicity  of  the  rude.  Hear  next  a  piece  of  Spenser's  teach- 
ing  how  rudeness  itself  may  become  more  beautiful  even  by 
its  mistakes,  if  the  mistakes  are  made  lovingly, 

*  Ye  shepherds '  daughters  that  dwell  on  the  green, 

Hye  you  there  apace  ; 
Let  none  come  there  but  that  virgins  been 

To  adorn  her  grace  : 
And  when  you  come,  whereas  she  in  place, 
See  that  your  rudeness  do  not  you  disgrace  ; 

Bind  your  fillets  fast, 

And  gird  in  your  waste, 
I  or  more  fineness,  with  a  taudry  lace.' 


FICTION— FAIR  AND  FOUL. 


213 


*  Bring  hither  the  pink  and  purple  cullumbine 

With  gylliflowers  ; 
Bring  coronations,  and  sops  in  wine, 

Worn  of  paramours  ; 
Strow  me  the  ground  with  daffadowndillies 
And  cowslips,  and  kingcups,  and  loved  lilies ; 

The  pretty  paunce 

And  the  chevisaunce 
Shall  match  with  the  fair  flowre-delice. ' 1 

Two  short  pieces  more  only  of  master  song,  and  we  have 
enough  to  test  all  by. 

(2)  *  No  more,  no  more,  since  thou  art  dead, 

Shall  we  e'er  bring  coy  brides  to  bed, 
No  more,  at  yearly  festivals, 

We  cowslip  balls 
Or  chains  of  columbines  shall  make, 
For  this  or  that  occasion's  sake. 
No,  no!  our  maiden  pleasures  be 
Wrapt  in  thy  winding-sheet  with  thee.' 3 

(3)  '  Death  is  now  the  phoenix  rest, 

And  the  turtle's  loyal  breast 
To  eternity  doth  rest. 
Truth  may  seem,  but  cannot  be ; 
Beauty  brag,  but  'tis  not  she  : 
Truth  and  beauty  buried  be/  3 

If  now,  with  the  echo  of  these  perfect  verses  in  your  mind, 
you  turn  to  Byron,  and  glance  over,  or  recall  to  memory, 
enough  of  him  to  give  means  of  exact  comparison,  you  will, 
or  should,  recognise  these  following  kinds  of  mischief  in  him. 
First,  if  any  one  offends  him — as  for  instance  Mr.  Southey,  or 
Lord  Elgin — c  his  manners  have  not  that  repose  that  marks 
the  caste,'  &c.    This  defect  in  his  Lordship's  style,  being  my- 

1  Shepherd's  Calendar.  4  Coronati  in,'  loyal-pastoral  for  Carnation  ; 
*  sops  in  wine,'  jolly-pastoral  for  double  pink;  4  paunce,'  thoughtless 
pastoral  for  pansy  ;  \  chevisaunce  '  I  don't  know,  (not  in  Gerarde) ; 
4  flowre-delice  ' — pronounce  dellice — half  made  up  of  '  delicate '  and  *  de* 
licious.' 

Herrick,  Dirge  for  Jephthah's  Daughter,        3  Passionate  Pilgrim. 


211 


FICTION— FAIR  AN  I)  FOUL. 


self  scrupulously  and  even  painfully  reserved  in  the  use  of 
vituperative  language,  I  need  not  say  how  deeply  I  de- 
plore.1 

Secondly.  In  the  best  and  most  violet-bedded  bits  of  his 
work  there  is  yet,  as  compared  with  Elizabethan  and  earlier 
verse,  a  strange  taint  ;  and  indefinable — evening  flavour  of 
Covent  Garden,  as  it  were  ; — not  to  say,  escape  of  gas  in  the 
Strand.  That  is  simply  what  it  proclaims  itself — London  air. 
If  he  had  lived  all  his  life  in  Green-head  .Ghyll,  things  would 
of  course  have  been  different.  But  it  was  his  fate  to  come  to 
town — modern  town — like  Michael's  son  ;  and  modern  Lon- 
don (and  Venice)  are  answerable  for  the  state  of  their  drains, 
not  Byron. 

Thirdly.  His  melancholy  is  without  any  relief  whatsoever  ; 
his  jest  sadder  than  his  earnest ;  while,  in  Elizabethan  work, 
all  lament  is  full  of  hope,  and  ail  pain  of  balsam. 

Of  this  evil  he  has  himself  told  you  the  cause  in  a  single 
line,  prophetic  of  all  things  since  and  now.  c  Where  he  gazed, 
a  gloom  pervaded  space.' 2 

So  that,  for  instance,  while  Mr.  Wordsworth,  on  a  visit  to 
town,  being  an  exemplary  early  riser,  could  walk,  felicitous, 
on  Westminster  Bridge,  remarking  how  the  city  now  did  like 
a  garment  wear  the  beauty  of  the  morning ;  Byron,  rising 
somewhat  later,  contemplated  only  the  garment  which  the 
beauty  of  the  morning  had  by  that  time  received  for  wear 
from  the  city  :  and  again,  while  Mr.  Wordsworth,  in  irrepres- 
sible religious  rapture,  calls  God  to  witness  that  the  houses 
seem  asleep,  Byron,  lame  demon  as  he  was,  flying  smoke- 
drifted,  unroofs  the  houses  at  a  glance,  and  sees  what  the 

1  In  this  point,  compare  the  Curse  of  Minerva  with  the  Tears  of  the 
Muses. 

2  'He,' — Lucifer;  {  Vision  of  Judgment,  24).  It  is  precisely  because 
Byron  was  not  his  servant,  that  he  could  see  the  gloom.  To  the  Devil's 
true  servants,  their  Master's  presence  brings  both  cheerfulness  and  pros- 
perity ; — with  a  delightful  sense  of  their  own  wisdom  and  virtue  ;  and 
of  the  *  progress'  of  things  in  general : — in  smooth  sea  and  fair  weather, 
— and  with  no  need  either  of  helm  touch,  or  oar  toil :  as  when  once  one 
is  well  within  the  edge  of  Maelstrom. 


FICTION— FAIR  AND  FOUL. 


215 


mighty  cockney  heart  of  them  contains  in  the  still  lying  of  it, 
and  will  stir  up  to  purpose  in  the  waking  business  of  it, 

*  The  sordor  of  civilisation,  mixed 
With  all  the  passions  which  Man's  fall  hath  fixed.* 1 

Fourthly,  with  this  steadiness  of  bitter  melancholy,  there  is 
joined  a  sense  of  the  material  beauty,  both  of  inanimate  na- 
ture, the  lower  animals,  and  human  beings,  which  in  the  iri- 
descence, colour-depth,  and  morbid  (I  use  the  word  deliberately) 
mystery  and  softness  of  it, — with  other  qualities  indescribable 
by  any  single  words,  and  only  to  be  analysed  by  extreme  care, 
— is  found,  to  the  full,  only  in  five  men  that  I  know  of  in 
modern  times ;  namely  Bousseau,  Shelley,  Byron,  Turner, 
and  myself, — differing  totally  and  throughout  the  entire  group 
of  us,  from  the  delight  in  clear-struck  beauty  of  Angelico  and 
the  Trecentisti ;  and  separated,  much  more  singularly,  from 
the  cheerful  joys  of  Chaucer,  Shakespeare,  and  Scott,  by  its 
unaccountable  affection  for  '  Kokkes  blak  9  and  other  forms 
of  terror  and  power,  such  as  those  of  the  ice-oceans,  which  to 
Shakespeare  were  only  Alpine  rheum  ;  and  the  Via  Malas  and 
Diabolic  Bridges  which  Dante  would  have  condemned  none 
but  lost  souls  to  climb,  or  cross  ; — all  this  love  of  impending 
mountains,  coiled  thunder-clouds,  and  dangerous  sea,  being 
joined  in  us  with  a  sulky,  almost  ferine,  love  of  retreat  in  val- 
leys of  Charmettes,  gulphs-  of  Spezzia,  ravines  of  Olympus,  low 
lodgings  in  Chelsea,  and  close  brushwood  at  Coniston. 

And,  lastly,  also  in  the  whole  group  of  us,  glows  volcanic 
instinct  of  Astrasan  justice  returning  not  to,  but  up  out  of,  the 
earth,  which  will  not  at  all  suffer  us  to  rest  any  more  in  Pope's 
serene  6  whatever  is,  is  right ; '  but  holds,  on  the  contrary,  pro- 
found conviction  that  about  ninety-nine  hundredths  of  what- 
ever at  present  is,  is  wrong  :  conviction  making  four  of  us, 

1  Island,  ii.  4  ;  perfectly  orthodox  theology,  you  observe ;  no  denial 
of  the  fall,— nor  substitution  of  Bacterian  birth  for  it.  Nay,  nearly 
Evangelical  theology,  in  contempt  for  the^human  heart ;  but  with  deeper 
than  Evangelical  humility,  acknowledging  also  what  is  sordid  in  its 
civilisation. 


216 


FICTION— FAIR  AND  FOUL. 


according  to  our  several  manners,  leaders  of  revolution  for 
the  poor,  and  declarers  of  political  doctrine  monstrous  to  the 
ears  of  mercenary  mankind  ;  and  driving  the  fifth,  less  san- 
guine, into  mere  painted-melody  of  lament  over  the  fallacy  of 
Hope  and  the  implacabieness  of  Fate. 

In  Byron  the  indignation,  the  sorrow,  and  the  effort  are 
joined  to  the  death  :  and  they  are  the  parts  of  his  nature  (as 
of  mine  also  in  its  feebler  terms),  which  the  selfishly  comforta- 
ble public  have,  literally,  no  conception  of  whatever  ;  and  from 
which  the  piously  sentimental  public,  offering  up  daily  the 
pure  emotion  of  divine  tranquillity,  shrink  with  anathema  not 
unembittered  by  alarm. 

Concerning  which  matters  I  hope  to  speak  further  and  with 
more  precise  illustration  in  my  next  paper ;  but,  seeing  that  this 
present  one  has  been  hitherto  somewhat  sombre,  and  perhaps, 
to  gentle  readers,  not  a  little  discomposing,  I  will  conclude  it 
with  a  piece  of  light  biographic  study,  necessary  to  my  plan, 
and  as  conveniently  admissible  in  this  place  as  afterwards  ; — 
namely,  the  account  of  the  manner  in  which  Scott — whom  we 
shall  always  find,  as  aforesaid,  to  be  in  salient  and  palpable 
elements  of  character,  of  the  World,  worldly,  as  Burns  is  of  the 
Flesh,  fleshly,  and  Byron  of  the  Deuce,  damnable, — spent  his 
Sunday. 

As  usual,  from  Lockhart's  farrago  we  cannot  find  out  the 
first  thing  we  want  to  know, — wThether  Scott  worked  after  his 
week-day  custom,  on  the  Sunday  morning.  But,  I  gather, 
not ;  at  all  events  his  household  and  his  cattle  rested  (L.  iii. 
108).  I  imagine  he  walked  out  into  his  woods,  or  read  quietly 
in  his  study.  Immediately  after  breakfast,  whoever  was  in 
the  house,  '  Ladies  and  gentlemen,  I  shall  read  prayers  at 
eleven,  when  I  expect  you  all  to  attend '  (vii.  306).  Question 
of  college  and  other  externally  unanimous  prayers  settled  for 
us  very  briefly  :  '  if  you  have  no  faith,  have  at  least  manners.' 
He  read  the  Church  of  England  service,  lessons  and  all,  the 
latter,  if  interesting,  eloquently  (ibid.).  After  the  service,  one 
of  Jeremy  Taylor's  sermons  (vi.  188).  After  the  sermon,  if  the 
weather  was  fine,  walk  with  his  family,  do'gs  included  and 
guests,  to  cold  picnic  (iii.  109),  followed  by  short  extempore 


FICTION— FAIR  AND  FOUL. 


217 


biblical  novelettes  ;  for  he  had  his  Bible,  the  Old  Testa- 
ment especially,  by  heart,  it  having  been  his  mother's  last  gift 
to  him  (vi.  174).  These  lessons  to  his  children  in  Bible  his- 
tory were  always  given,  whether  there  was  picnic  or  not.  For 
the  rest  of  the  afternoon  he  took  his  pleasure  in  the  woods 
with  Tom  Purdie,  who  also  always  appeared  at  his  master's 
elbow  on  Sunday  after  dinner  was  over,  and  drank  long  life 
to  the  laird  and  his  lady  and  all  the  good  company,  in  a  quaigh 
of  whiskey  or  a  tumbler  of  wine,  according  to  his  fancy  (vi. 
195).  Whatever  might  happen  on  the  other  evenings  of  the 
week,  Scott  always  dined  at  home  on  Sunday  ;  and  with  old 
friends  :  never,  unless  inevitably,  receiving  any  person  with 
whom  he  stood  on  ceremony  (v.  335).  He  came  into  the  room 
rubbing  his  hands  like  a  boy  arriving  at  home  for  the  holidays, 
his  Peppers  and  Mustards  gambolling  about  him,  '  and  even 
the  stately  Maida  grinning  and  wagging  his  tail  with  sympa- 
thy.' For  the  usquebaugh  of  the  less  honoured  week-days,  at 
the  Sunday  board  he  circulated  the  champagne  briskly  during 
dinner,  and  considered  a  pint  of  claret  each  man's  fair  share 
afterwards  (v.  339).  In  the  evening,  music  being  to  the  Scot- 
tish worldly  mind  indecorous,  he  read  aloud  some  favourite 
author,  for  the  amusement  or  edification  of  his  little  circle. 
Shakespeare  it  might  be,  or  Dry  den, — Johnson,  or  Joanna 
Baillie, — Crabbe,  or  Wordsworth.  But  in  those  days  'Byron 
was  pouring  out  his  spirit  fresh  and  full,  and  if  a  new  piece 
from  his  hand  had  appeared,  it  was  sure  to  be  read  by  Scott  the 
Sunday  evening  afterwards  ;  and  that  with  such  delighted  em- 
phasis as  showed  how  completely  the  elder  bard  had  kept  up 
his  enthusiasm  for  poetry  at  pitch  of  youth,  and  all  his  admira- 
tion of  genius,  free,  pure,  and  unstained  by  the  least  drop  of 
literary  jealousy  ?  (v.  341). 

With  such  necessary  and  easily  imaginable  varieties  as 
chanced  in  having  Dandy  Dinmont  or  Captain  Brown  for 
guests  at  Abbotsford,  or  Colonel  Mannering,  Counsellor  Pley- 
clell,  and  Dr.  Kobertson  in  Castle  Street,  such  was  Scott's 
habitual  Sabbath  :  a  day,  we  perceive,  of  eating  the  fat,  (din- 
ner, presumably  not  cold,  being  a  work  of  necessity  and  mercy 
— thou  also,  even  thou,  Saint  Thomas  of  Trumbull,  hast 


218 


FICTION— FAIR  AND  FOUL. 


thine  !)  and  drinking  the  sweet,  abundant  in  the  manner  of 
Mr.  Southey's  cataract  of  Lodore, — £Here  it  comes,  sparkling.' 
A  day  bestrewn  with  coronations  and  sops  in  wine  ;  deep  in 
libations  to  good  hope  and  fond  memory  ;  a  day  of  rest  to 
beast,  and  mirth  to  man,  (as  also  to  sympathetic  beasts  that 
can  be  merry,)  and  concluding  itself  in  an  Orphic  hour  of  de- 
light, signifying  peace  on  Tweedside,  and  goodwill  to  men, 
there  or  far  away  ; — always  excepting  the  French,  and  Boney. 

'  Yes,  and  see  what  it  all  came  to  in  the  end/ 

Not  so,  dark-virulent  Minos-Mucklewrath  ;  the  end  came  of 
quite  other  things  :  of  these,  came  such  length  of  days  and 
peace  as  Scott  had  in  his  Fatherland,  and  such  immortality  as 
he  has  in  all  lands. 

Nathless,  firm,  though  deeply  courteous,  rebuke,  for  his 
sometimes  overmuch  light-mindedness,  was  administered  to 
him  by  the  more  grave  and  thoughtful  Byron.  For  the  Lord 
Abbot  of  Newstead  knew  his  Bible  by  heart  as  well  as  Scott, 
though  it  had  never  been  given  him  by  his  mother  as  her  dear- 
est possession.  Knew  it,  and,  what  was  more,  had  thought  of 
ifc,  and  sought  in  it  what  Scott  had  never  cared  to  think, 
nor  been  fain  to  seek. 

And  loving  Scott  well,  and  always  doing  him  every  possible 
pleasure  in  the  way  he  sees  to  be  most  agreeable  to  him — as, 
for  instance,  remembering  with  precision,  and  writing  down 
the  very  next  morning,  every  blessed  word  that  the  Prince 
Regent  had  been  pleased  to  say  of  him  before  courtly  audi- 
ence,— he  yet  conceived  that  such  cheap  ryming  as  his  own 
Bride  of  Abydos,  for  instance,  which  he  had  written  from  be- 
ginning to  end  in  four  days,  or  even  the  travelling  reflections 
of  Harold  and  Juan  on  men  and  women,  were  scarcely  steady 
enough  Sunday  afternoon's  reading  for  a  patriarch-Merlin  like 
Scott.  So  he  dedicates  to  him  a  work  of  a  truly  religious  ten- 
dency, on  which  for  his  own  part  he  has  done  his  best, — the 
drama  of  Gain.  Of  which  dedication  the  virtual  significance 
to  Sir  Walter  might  be  translated  thus.  Dearest  and  last  of 
Border  soothsayers,  thou  hast  indeed  told  us  of  Black  Dwarfs, 
and  of  White  Maidens,  also  of  Grey  Friars,  and  Green  Fairies  ; 
also  of  sacred  hollies  by  the  well,  and  haunted  crooks  in  the 


FICTION-FAIR  AND  FOUL. 


219 


glen.  But  of  the  bushes  that  the  black  dogs  rend  in  the 
woods  of  Phlegethon  ;  and  of  the  crooks  in  the  glen,  and  the 
bickerings  of  the  burnie  where  ghosts  meet  the  mightiest  of 
us  ;  and  of  the  black  misanthrope,  who  is  by  no  means  yet  a 
dwarfed  one,  and  concerning  whom  wiser  creatures  than 
Hobbie  Elliot  may  tremblingly  ask  '  Gude  guide  us,  what's 
yon  ? '  hast  thou  yet  known,  seeing  that  thou  hast  yet  told, 
nothing. 

Scott  may  perhaps  have  his  answer.  We  shall  in  good  time 
hear. 

John  Euskin. 


THE 

ELEMENTS  OF  DRAWING 

IN 

THREE  LETTERS  TO  BEGINNERS 

"WITH  ILLUSTRATIONS  DRAWN  Br  THE  AUTHOR 


PEEFACE. 


It  may  perhaps  be  thought,  that  in  prefacing  a  Manual  of 
Drawing,  I  ought  to  expatiate  on  the  reasons  why  drawing 
should  be  learned ;  but  those  reasons  appear  to  me  so  many 
and  so  weighty,  that  I  cannot  quickly  state  or  enforce  them. 
With  the  reader's  permission,  as  this  volume  is  too  large  al- 
ready, I  will  waive  all  discussion  respecting  the  importance 
of  the  subject,  and  touch  only  on  those  points  which  may  ap- 
pear questionable  in  the  method  of  its  treatment. 

In  the  first  place,  the  book  is  not  calculated  for  the  use  of 
children  under  the  age  of  twelve  or  fourteen.  I  do  not  think 
it  advisable  to  engage  a  child  in  any  but  the  most  voluntary 
practice  of  art.  If  it  has  talent  for  drawing,  it  will  be  con- 
tinually scrawling  on  what  paper  it  can  get ;  and  should  be 
allowed  to  scrawl  at  its  own  free  will,  due  praise  being  given 
for  every  appearance  of  care,  or  truth,  in  its  efforts.  It  should 
be  allowed  to  amuse  itself  with  cheap  colours  almost  as  soon 
as  it  has  sense  enough  to  wish  for  them.  If  it  merely  daubs 
the  paper  with  shapeless  stains,  the  colour-box  may  be  taken 
away  till  it  knows  better :  but  as  soon  as  it  begins  painting 
red  coats  on  soldiers,  striped  flags  to  ships,  etc.,  it  should 
have  colours  at  command  ;  and,  without  restraining  its  choice 
of  subject  in  that  imaginative  and  historical  art,  of  a  military 
tendency,  which  children  delight  in,  (generally  quite  as  valu- 
able, by  the  way,  as  any  historical  art  delighted  in  by  their 
elders,)  it  should  be  gently  led  by  the  parents  to  try  to  draw, 
in  such  childish  fashion  as  may  be,  the  things  it  can  see  and 


224 


PREFACE, 


likes, — birds,  or  butterflies,  or  flowers,  or  fruit.  In  later  years, 
the  indulgence  of  using  the  colour  should  only  be  granted  as 
a  reward,  after  it  has  shown  care  and  progress  in  its  drawings 
with  pencil.  A  limited  number  of  good  and  amusing  prints 
should  always  be  within  a  boy's  reach  :  in  these  days  of  cheap 
illustration  he  can  hardly  possess  a  volume  of  nursery  tales 
without  good  woodcuts  in  it,  and  should  be  encouraged  to  copy 
what  he  likes  best  of  this  kind  ;  but  should  be  firmly  restricted 
to  a  few  prints  and  to  a  few  books.  If  a  child  has  many  toys, 
it  will  get  tired  of  them  and  break  them  ;  if  a  boy  has  many 
prints  he  will  merely  dawdle  and  scrawl  over  them  ;  it  is  by 
the  limitation  of  the  number  of  his  possessions  that  his  pleas- 
ure in  them  is  perfected,  and  his  attention  concentrated.  The 
parents  need  give  themselves  no  trouble  in  instructing  him,  as 
far  as  drawing  is  concerned,  beyond  insisting  upon  economi- 
cal and  neat  habits  with  his  colours  and  paper,  showing  him 
the  best  way  of  holding  pencil  and  rule,  and,  so  far  as  they 
take  notice  of  his  work,  pointing  out  where  a  line  is  too  short 
or  too  long,  or  too  crooked,  when  compared  with  the  copy ; 
accuracy  being  the  first  and  last  thing  they  look  for.  If  the 
child  shows  talent  for  inventing  or  grouping  figures,  the  par- 
ents should  neither  check,  nor  praise  it.  They  may  laugh  with 
it  frankly,  or  show  pleasure  in  what  it  has  done,  just  as  they 
show  pleasure  in  seeing  it  well,  or  cheerful ;  but  they  must 
not  praise  it  for  being  clever,  any  more  than  they  would  praise 
it  for  being  stout.  They  should  praise  it  only  for  what  costs 
it  self-denial,  namely  attention  and  hard  work  ;  otherwise 
they  will  make  it  work  for  vanity's  sake,  and  always  badly. 
The  best  books  to  put  into  its  hands  are  those  illustrated 
by  George  Cruikshank  or  by  Eichter.  (See  Appendix.)  At 
about  the  age  of  twelve  or  fourteen,  it  is  quite  time  enough 
to  set  youth  or  girl  to  serious  work  ;  and  then  this  book  will, 
I  think,  be  useful  to  them  ;  and  I  have  good  hope  it  may  be 
so,  likewise,  to  persons  of  more  advanced  age  wishing  to  know 
something  of  the  first  principles  of  art. 

Yet  observe,  that  the  method  of  study  recommended  is  not 
brought  forward  as  absolutely  the  best,  but  only  as  the  best 
which  I  can  at  present  devise  for  an  isolated  student.    It  is 


PREFACE. 


225 


very  likely  that  farther  experience  in  teaching  may  enable  me 
to  modify  it  with  advantage  in  several  important  respects  ;  but 
I  am  sure  the  main  principles  of  it  are  sound,  and  most  of  the 
exercises  as  useful  as  they  can  be  rendered  without  a  master's 
superintendence.  The  method  differs,  however,  so  materially 
from  that  generally  adopted  by  drawing-masters,  that  a  wrord 
or  two  of  explanation  may  be  needed  to  justify  what  might 
otherwise  be  thought  wilful  eccentricity. 

The  manuals  at  present  published  on  the  subject  of  drawing 
are  all  directed,  as  far  as  I  know,  to  one  or  other  of  two  ob- 
jects. Either  they  propose  to  give  the  student  a  power  of  dex- 
terous sketching  with  pencil  or  water-colour,  so  as  to  emulate 
(at  considerable  distance)  the  slighter  work  of  our  second-rate 
artists  ;  or  they  propose  to  give  him  such  accurate  command 
of  mathematical  forms  as  may  afterwards  enable  him  to  design 
rapidly  and  cheaply  for  manufactures.  When  drawing  is  taught 
as  an  accomplishment,  the  first  is  the  aim  usually  proposed ; 
while  the  second  is  the  object  kept  chiefly  in  view  at  Marl- 
borough House,  and  in  the  branch  Government  Schools  of 
Design. 

Of  the  fitness  of  the  modes  of  study  adopted  in  those  schools, 
to  the  end  specially  intended,  judgment  is  hardly  yet  pos- 
sible ;  only,  it  seems  to  me,  that  we  are  all  too  much  in  the 
habit  of  confusing  art  as  applied  to  manufacture,  with  manufact- 
ure itself.  For  instance,  the  skill  by  which  an  inventive  work- 
man designs  and  moulds  a  beautiful  cup,  is  skill  of  true  art ;  but 
the  skill  by  which  that  cup  is  copied  and  afterwards  multi- 
plied a  thousandfold,  is  skill  of  manufacture  :  and  the  faculties 
which  enable  one  workman  to  design  and  elaborate  his  original 
piece,  are  not  to  be  developed  by  the  same  system  of  instruc- 
tion as  those  which  enable  another  to  produce  a  maximum 
number  of  approximate  copies  of  it  in  a  given  time.  Farther  : 
it  is  surely  inexpedient  that  any  reference  to  purposes  of 
manufacture  should  interfere  with  the  education  of  the  artist 
himself.  Try  first  to  manufacture  a  Eaphael ;  then  let  Raph- 
ael direct  your  manufacture.  He  will  design  you  a  plate,  or 
cup,  or  a  house,  or  a  palace,  whenever  you  want  it,  and  de- 
sign them  in  the  most  convenient  and  rational  way  ;  but  da 


PREFACE, 


not  let  your  anxiety  to  reach  the  platter  and  the  cup  interfere 
with  your  education  of  the  Raphael.  Obtain  first  the  best 
work  you  can,  and  the  ablest  hands,  irrespective  of  any  con- 
sideration of  economy  or  facility  of  production.  Then  leave 
your  trained  artist  to  determine  how  far  art  can  be  popular- 
ised, or  manufacture  ennobled. 

Now,  I  believe  that  (irrespective  of  differences  in  individual 
temper  and  character)  the  excellence  of  an  artist,  as  such, 
depends  wholly  on  refinement  of  perception,  and  that  it  is 
this,  mainly,  which  a  master  or  a  school  can  teach ;  so 
that  while  powers  of  invention  distinguish  man  from  man, 
powers  of  perception  distinguish  school  from  school.  All 
great  schools  enforce  delicacy  of  drawing  and  subtlety  of 
sight :  and  the  only  rule  which  I  have,  as  yet,  found  to  be 
without  exception  respecting  art,  is  that  all  great  art  is  deli- 
cate. 

Therefore,  the  chief  aim  and  bent  of  the  following  system 
is  to  obtain,  first,  a  perfectly  patient,  and,  to  the  utmost  of 
the  pupil's  power,  a  delicate  method  of  work,  such  as  may 
ensure  his  seeing  truly.  For  I  am  nearly  convinced,  that 
when  once  we  see  keenly  enough,  there  is  very  little  difficulty 
in  drawing  what  we  see  ;  but,  even  supposing  that  this  diffi- 
culty be  still  great,  I  believe  that  the  sight  is  a  more  im- 
portant thing  than  the  drawing  ;  and  I  would  rather  teach 
drawing  that  my  pupils  may  learn  to  love  Nature,  than  teach 
the  looking  at  Nature  that  they  may  learn  to  draw.  It  is 
surely  also  a  more  important  thing  for  young  people  and  un- 
professional students,  to  know  how  to  appreciate  the  art  of 
others,  than  to  gain  much  power  in  art  themselves.  Now  the 
modes  of  sketching  ordinarily  taught  are  inconsistent  with 
this  power  of  judgment.  No  person  trained  to  the  superficial 
execution  of  modern  wTater-colour  painting,  can  understand 
the  work  of  Titian  or  Leonardo  ;  they  must  for  ever  remain 
blind  to  the  refinement  of  such  men's  pencilling,  and  the  pre- 
cision of  their  thinking.  But,  however  slight  a  degree  of 
manipulative  power  the  student  may  reach  by  pursuing  the 
mode  recommended  to  him  in  these  letters,  I  will  answer  for 
it  that  he  cannot  go  once  through  the  advised  exercises  without 


PREFACE. 


227 


beginning  to  understand  what  masterly  work  means  ;  and,  by 
the  time  he  has  gained  some  proficiency  in  them,  he  will  have 
a  pleasure  in  looking  at  the  painting  of  the  great  schools,  and 
a  new  perception  of  the  exquisiteness  of  natural  scenery,  such 
as  would  repay  him  for  much  more  labour  than  I  have  asked 
him  to  undergo. 

That  labour  is,  nevertheless,  sufficiently  irksome,  nor  is  it 
possible  that  it  should  be  otherwise,  so  long  as  the  pupil 
works  unassisted  by  a  master.  For  the  smooth  and  straight 
road  which  admits  unembarrassed  progress  must,  I  fear,  be 
dull  as  well  as  smooth  ;  and  the  hedges  need  to  be  close  and 
trim  when  there  is  no  guide  to  warn  or  bring  back  the  erring 
traveller.  The  system  followed  in  this  work  will,  therefore, 
at  first,  surprise  somewhat  sorrowfully  those  who  are  familiar 
with  the  practice  of  our  class  at  the  Working  Men's  College  ; 
for  there,  the  pupil,  having  the  master  at  his  side  to  extricate 
him  from  such  embarrassments  as  his  first  efforts  may  lead 
into,  is  at  once  set  to  draw  from  a  solid  object,  and  soon  finds 
entertainment  in  his  efforts  and  interest  in  his  difficulties. 
Of  course  the  simplest  object  which  it  is  possible  to  set  before 
the  eye  is  a  sphere  ;  and  practically,  I  find  a  child's  toy,  a 
white  leather  ball,  better  than  anything  else  ;  as  the  gradations 
on  balls  of  plaster  of  Paris,  which  I  use  sometimes  to  try  the 
strength  of  pupils  who  have  had  previous  practice,  are  a  little 
too  delicate  for  a  beginner  to  perceive.  It  has  been  objected 
that  a  circle,  or  the  outline  of  a  sphere,  is  one  of  the  most 
difficult  of  all  lines  to  draw.  It  is  so  ;  but  I  do  not  want  it  to 
be  drawn.  All  that  his  study  of  the  ball  is  to  teach  the  pupil, 
is  the  way  in  which  shade  gives  the  appearance  of  projection. 
This  he  learns  most  satisfactorily  from  a  sphere  ;  because  any 
solid  form,  terminated  by  straight  lines  or  flat  surfaces,  owes 
some  of  its  appearance  of  projection  to  its  perspective  ;  but  in 
the  sphere,  what,  without  shade,  was  a  flat  circle,  becomes, 
merely  by  the  added  shade,  the  image  of  a  solid  ball ;  and  this 
fact  is  just  as  striking  to  the  learner,  whether  his  circular  out- 
line be  true  or  false.  He  is,  therefore,  never  allowed  to 
trouble  himself  about  it  ;  if  he  makes  the  ball  look  as  oval  as 
an  egg,  the  degree  of  error  is  simply  pointed  out  to  him,  and 


228 


PREFACE. 


he  does  better  next  time,  and  better  still  the  next.  But  his 
mind  is  always  fixed  on  the  gradation  of  shade,  and  the  out- 
line left  to  take,  in  due  time,  care  of  itself.  I  call  it  outline, 
for  the  sake  of  immediate  intelligibility, — strictly  speaking,  it 
is  merely  the  edge  of  the  shade  ;  no  pupil  in  my  class  being 
ever  allowed  to  draw  an  outline,  in  the  ordinary  sense.  It  is 
pointed  out  to  him,  from  the  first,  that  Nature  relieves  one 
mass,  or  one  tint,  against  another ;  but  outlines  none.  The 
outline  exercise,  the  second  suggested  in  this  letter,  is  recom- 
mended, not  to  enable  the  pupil  to  draw  outlines,  but  as  the 
only  means  by  which,  unassisted,  he  can  test  his  accuracy  of 
eye,  and  discipline  his  hand.  When  the  master  is  by,  errors 
in  the  form  and  extent  of  shadows  can  be  pointed  out  as 
easily  as  in  outline,  and  the  handling  can  be  gradually  cor- 
rected in  details  of  the  work.  Bat  the  solitary  student  can 
only  find  out  his  own  mistakes  by  help  of  the  traced  limit,  and 
can  only  test  the  firmness  of  his  hand  by  an  exercise  in  which 
nothing  but  firmness  is  required  ;  and  during  which  all  other 
considerations  (as  of  softness,  complexity,  &c.)  are  entirely 
excluded. 

Both  the  system  adopted  at  the  Working  Men's  College, 
and  that  recommended  here,  agree,  however,  in  one  principle, 
which  I  consider  the  most  important  and  special  of  all  that 
are  involved  in  my  teaching :  namely,  the  attaching  its  full 
importance,  from  the  first,  to  local  colour.  I  believe  that  the 
endeavour  to  separate,  in  the  course  of  instruction,  the  ob- 
servation of  light  and  shade  from  that  of  local  colour,  has 
always  been,  and  must  always  be,  destructive  of  the  student's 
power  of  accurate  sight,  and  that  it  corrupts  his  taste  as  much 
as  it  retards  his  progress.  I  will  not  occupy  the  reader's  time 
by  any  discussion  of  the  principle  here,  but  I  wish  him  to 
note  it  as  the  only  distinctive  one  in  my  system,  so  far  as  it  is 
a  system.  For  the  recommendation  to  the  pupil  to  copy  faith- 
fully, and  without  alteration,  whatever  natural  object  he 
chooses  to  study,  is  serviceable,  among  other  reasons,  just  be- 
cause it  gets  rid  of  systematic  rules  altogether,  and  teaches 
people  to  draw,  as  country  lads  learn  to  ride,  without  saddle 
or  stirrups ;  my  main  object  being,  at  first,  not  to  get  my 


PREFACE. 


229 


pupils  to  hold  their  reins  prettily,  but  to  "  sit  like  a  jack- 
anapes, never  off." 

In  these  written  instructions,  therefore,  it  has  always  been 
with  regret  that  I  have  seen  myself  forced  to  advise  anything 
like  monotonous  or  formal  discipline.  But,  to  the  unassisted 
student,  such  formalities  are  indispensable,  and  I  am  not  with- 
out hope  that  the  sense  of  secure  advancement,  and  the  pleas- 
ure of  independent  effort,  may  render  the  following  out  of 
even  the  more  tedious  exercises  here  proposed,  possible  to  the 
solitary  learner,  without  weariness.  But  if  it  should  be  other- 
wise, and  he  finds  the  first  steps  painfully  irksome,  I  can  only 
desire  him  to  consider  whether  the  acquirement  of  so  great  a 
power  as  that  of  pictorial  expression  of  thought  be  not  worth 
some  toil  ;  or  whether  it  is  likely,  in  the  natural  order  of 
matters  in  this  working  world,  that  so  great  a  gift  should  be 
attainable  by  those  who  will  give  no  price  for  it. 

One  task,  however,  of  some  difficulty,  the  student  will  find 
I  have  not  imposed  upon  him  :  namely,  learning  the  laws  of 
perspective.  It  would  be  worth  while  to  learn  them,  if  he 
could  do  so  easily  ;  but  without  a  master's  help,  and  in  the 
way  perspective  is  at  present  explained  in  treatises,  the  diffi- 
culty is  greater  than  the  gain.  For  perspective  is  not  of  the 
slightest  use,  except  in  rudimentary  work.  You  can  draw  the 
rounding  line  of  a  table  in  perspective,  but  you  cannot  draw 
the  sweep  of  a  sea  bay  ;  you  can  foreshorten  a  log  of  wood 
by  it,  but  you  cannot  foreshorten  an  arm.  Its  laws  are  too 
gross  and  few  to  be  applied  to  any  subtle  form  ;  therefore,  as 
you  must  learn  to  draw  the  subtle  forms  by  the  eye,  certainly 
you  may  draw  the  simple  ones.  No  great  painters  ever 
trouble  themselves  about  perspective,  and  very  few  of  them 
know  its  laws ;  they  draw  everything  by  the  eye,  and,  nat- 
urally enough,  disdain  in  the  easy  parts  of  their  work  rules 
which  cannot  help  them  in  difficult  ones.  It  would  take 
about  a  month's  labour  to  draw  imperfectly,  by  laws  of  per- 
spective, what  any  great  Venetian  will  draw  perfectly  in  five 
minutes,  when  he  is  throwing  a  wreath  of  leaves  round  a 
head,  or  bending  the  curves  of  a  pattern  in  and  out  among 
the  folds  of  drapery.    It  is  true  that  when  perspective  way 


230 


PREFACE. 


first  discovered,  everybody  amused  themselves  with  it ;  and 
all  the  great  painters  put  fine  saloons  and  arcades  behind 
their  madonnas,  merely  to  show  that  they  could  draw  in  per. 
spective  :  but  even  this  was  generally  done  by  them  only  to 
catch  the  public  eye,  and  they  disdained  the  perspective  so 
much,  that  though  they  took  the  greatest  pains  with  the  cir- 
clet of  a  crown,  or  the  rim  of  a  crystal  cup,  in  the  heart  of 
their  picture,  they  would  twist  their  caj)itals  of  columns  and 
towers  of  churches  about  in  the  background  in  the  most  wan- 
ton way,  wherever  they  liked  the  lines  to  go,  provided  only 
they  left  just  perspective  enough  to  please  the  public.  In 
modern  days,  I  doubt  if  any  artist  among  us,  except  David 
Koberts,  knows  so  much  perspective  as  would  enable  him  to 
draw  a  Gothic  arch  to  scale,  at  a  given  angle  and  distance. 
Turner,  though  he  was  professor  of  perspective  to  the  Royal 
Academy,  did  not  know  what  he  professed,  and  never,  as  far 
as  I  remember,  drew  a  single  building  in  true  perspective  in 
his  life  ;  he  drew  them  only  with  as  much  perspective  as  suited 
him.  Prout  also  knew  nothing  of  perspective,  and  twisted 
his  buildings,  as  Turner  did,  into  whatever  shapes  he  liked. 
I  do  not  justify  this  ;  and  would  recommend  the  student  at 
least  to  treat  perspective  with  common  civility,  but  to  pay  no 
court  to  it.  The  best  way  he  can  learn  it,  by  himself,  is  by 
taking  a  pane  of  glass,  fixed  in  a  frame,  so  that  it  can  be  set 
upright  before  the  eye,  at  the  distance  at  which  the  proposed 
sketch  is  intended  to  be  seen.  Let  the  eye  be  placed  at  some 
fixed  point,  opposite  the  middle  of  the  pane  of  glass,  but  as 
high  or  as  low  as  the  student  likes  ;  then  with  a  brush  at  the 
end  of  a  stick,  and  a  little  body-colour  that  will  adhere  to  the 
glass,  the  lines  of  the  landscape  may  be  traced  on  the  glass, 
as  you  see  them  through  it.  When  so  traced  they  are  all  in 
true  perspective.  If  the  glass  be  sloped  in  any  direction,  the 
lines  are  still  in  true  perspective,  only  it  is  perspective  cal- 
culated for  a  sloping  plane,  while  common  perspective  always 
supposes  the  plane  of  the  picture  to  be  vertical.  It  is  good, 
in  early  practice,  to  accustom  yourself  to  enclose  your  subject, 
before  sketching  it,  with  a  light  frame  of  wood  held  upright 
before  you  ;  it  will  show  you  what  you  may  legitimately  take 


PREFACE. 


231 


into  your  picture,  and  what  choice  there  is  between  a  narrow 
foreground  near  you,  and  a  wide  one  farther  off ;  also,  what 
height  of  tree  or  building  you  can  properly  take  in,  &c.* 

Of  figure  drawing,  nothing  is  said  in  the  following  pages, 
because  I  do  not  think  figures,  as  chief  subjects,  can  be  drawn 
to  any  good  purpose  by  an  amateur.  As  accessaries  in  land- 
scape, they  are  just  to  be  drawn  on  the  same  principles  as 
anything  else. 

Lastly  :  If  any  of  the  directions  given  subsequently  to  the 
student  should  be  found  obscure  by  him,  or  if  at  any  stage  of 
the  recommended  practice  he  finds  himself  in  difficulties 
which  I  have  not  provided  enough  against,  he  may  apply  by 
letter  to  Mr.  Ward,  wTho  is  my  under  drawing-master  at  the 
Working  Men's  College  (45  Great  Ormond  Street),  and  who 
will  give  any  required  assistance,  on  the  lowest  terms  that 
can  remunerate  him  for  the  occupation  of  his  time.  I  have 
not  leisure  myself  in  general  to  answer  letters  of  inquiry, 
however  much  I  may  desire  to  do  so  ;  but  Mr.  Ward  has  al- 
ways the  power  of  referring  any  question  to  me  when  he 
thinks  it  necessary.  I  have  good  hope,  however,  that  enough 
guidance  is  given  in  this  work  to  prevent  the  occurrence  of 
any  serious  embarrassment ;  and  I  believe  that  the  student 
who  obeys  its  directions  will  find,  on  the  whole,  that  the  best 
answer  of  questions  is  perseverance  ;  and  the  best  drawing- 
masters  are  the  woods  and  hills. 

*  If  the  student  is  fond  of  architecture,  and  wishes  to  know  more  of 
perspective  than  he  can  learn  in  this  rough  way,  Mr.  Runciman  (of  49 
Accacia  Road,  St.  John's  Wood),  who  was  my  first  drawing-master,  and 
to  whom  I  owe  many  happy  hours,  can  teach  it  him  quickly,  easily,  and 
rightly. 


THE 

ELEMENTS    OF  DRAWING-. 


LETTER  I 

on   first  practice. 

My  Dear  Reader  : 

Whether  this  book  is  to  be  of  use  to  you  or  not,  depends 
wholly  on  your  reason  for  wishing  to  learn  to  draw.  If  you 
desire  only  to  possess  a  graceful  accomplishment,  to  be  able 
to  converse  in  a  fluent  manner  about  drawing,  or  to  amuse 
yourself  listlessly  in  listless  hours,  I  cannot  help  you  :  but  if 
you  wish  to  learn  drawing  that  you  may  be  able  to  set  down 
clearly,  and  usefully,  records  of  such  things  as  cannot  be  de- 
scribed in  words,  either  to  assist  your  own  memory  of  them, 
or  to  convey  distinct  ideas  of  them  to  other  people  ;  if  you 
wish  to  obtain  quicker  perceptions  of  the  beauty  of  the 
natural  world,  and  to  preserve  something  like  a  true  image  of 
beautiful  things  that  pass  away,  or  which  you  must  yourself 
leave  ;  if,  also,  you  wish  to  understand  the  minds  of  great 
painters,  and  to  be  able  to  appreciate  their  work  sincerely, 
seeing  it  for  yourself,  and  loving  it,  not  merely  taking  up  the 
thoughts  of  other  people  about  it  ;  then  I  can  help  you,  or, 
which  is  better,  show  you  how  to  help  yourself. 

Only  you  must  understand,  first  of  all,  that  these  powers 
which  indeed  are  noble  and  desirable,  cannot  be  got  without 
work.  It  is  much  easier  to  learn  to  draw  well,  than  it  is  to 
learn  to  play  well  on  any  musical  instrument ;  but  you  know 
that  it  takes  three  or  four  years  of  practice,  giving  three  or 


234 


THE  ELEMENTS  OF  DRAWING. 


four  hours  a  day,  to  acquire  even  ordinary  command  over  the 
keys  of  a  piano  ;  and  you  must  not  think  that  a  masterly  com- 
mand of  your  pencil,  and  the  knowledge  of  what  may  be  done 
with  it,  can  be  acquired  without  painstaking,  or  in  a  very 
short  time.  The  kind  of  drawing  which  is  taught,  or  sup- 
posed to  be  taught,  in  our  schools,  in  a  term  or  two,  perhaps 
at  the  rate  of  an  hour's  practice  a  week,  is  not  drawing  at  all. 
It  is  only  the  performance  of  a  few  dexterous  (not  always  even 
that)  evolutions  on  paper  with  a  black-lead  pencil ;  profitless 
alike  to  performer  and  beholder,  unless  as  a  matter  of  vanity, 
and  that  the  smallest  possible  vanity.  If  any  young  person, 
after  being  taught  what  is,  in  polite  circles,  called  "  drawing," 
will  try  to  copy  the  commonest  piece  of  real  work — suppose 
a  lithograph  on  the  titlepage  of  a  new  opera  air,  or  a  woodcut 
in  the  cheapest  illustrated  newspaper  of  the  day — they  will 
find  themselves  entirely  beaten.  And  yet  that  common  litho- 
graph was  drawn  with  coarse  chalk,  much  more  difficult  to 
manage  than  the  pencil  of  which  an  accomplished  young  lady 
is  supposed  to  have  command  ;  and  that  woodcut  was  drawn 
in  urgent  haste,  and  half  spoiled  in  the  cutting  afterwards  ; 
and  both  were  done  by  people  whom  nobody  thinks  of  as  ar- 
tists, or  praises  for  their  power  ;  both  were  done  for  daily 
bread,  with  no  more  artist's  pride  than  any  simple  handicrafts- 
men feel  in  the  work  they  live  by. 

Do  not,  therefore,  think  that  you  can  learn  drawing,  any  more 
than  a  new  language,  without  some  hard  and  disagreeable  la- 
bour. But  do  not,  on  the  other  hand,  if  you  are  ready  and 
willing  to  pay  this  price,  fear  that  you  may  be  unable  to  get 
on  for  want  of  special  talent.  It  is  indeed  true  that  the  per- 
sons who  have  peculiar  talent  for  art,  draw  instinctively  and 
get  on  almost  without  teaching ;  though  never  without  toil 
It  is  true,  also,  that  of  inferior  talent  for  drawing  there  are 
many  degrees  ;  it  will  take  one  person  a  much  longer  time 
than  another  to  attain  the  same  results,  and  the  results  thus 
painfully  attained  are  never  quite  so  satisfactory  as  those  got 
with  greater  ease  when  the  faculties  are  naturally  adapted  to 
the  study.  But  I  have  never  yet,  in  the  experiments  I  have 
made,  met  with  a  person  who  could  not  learn  to  draw  at  all ; 


ON  FIRST  PRACTICE. 


235 


and,  in  general,  there  is  a  satisfactory  and  available  power  in 
every  one  to  learn  drawing  if  he  wishes,  just  as  nearly  all  per- 
sons have  the  power  of  learning  French,  Latin,  or  arithmetic, 
in  a  decent  and  useful  degree,  if  their  lot  in  life  requires  them 
to  possess  such  knowledge. 

Supposing  then  that  you  are  ready  to  take  a  certain  amount 
of  pains,  and  to  bear  a  little  irksomeness  and  a  few  disappoint- 
ments bravely,  I  can  promise  you  that  an  hour's  practice  a  day 
for  six  months,  or  an  hour's  practice  every  other  day  for 
twelve  months,  or,  disposed  in  whatever  way  you  find  conve- 
nient, some  hundred  and  fifty  hours'  practice,  will  give  you 
sufficient  power  of  drawing  faithfully  whatever  you  want  to 
draw,  and  a  good  judgment,  up  to  a  certain  point,  of  other 
people's  work  :  of  which  hours,  if  you  have  one  to  spare  at 
present,  we  may  as  well  begin  at  once. 

EXERCISE  i. 

Everything  that  you  can  see,  in  the  world  around  you,  pre- 
sents itself  to  your  eyes  only  as  an  arrangement  of  patches  of 
different  colours  variously  shaded.*    Some  of  these  patches  of 

*  (N.  B.  This  note  is  only  for  the  satisfaction  of  incredulous  or  curious 
readers.  You  may  miss  it  if  you  are  in  a  hurry,  or  are  willing  to  take 
the  statement  in  the  text  on  trust.) 

The  perception  of  solid  Form  is  entirely  a  matter  of  experience.  We 
see  nothing  but  flat  colours  ;  and  it  is  only  by  a  series  of  experiments 
that  we  find  out  that  a  stain  of  black  or  grey  indicates  the  dark  side  of 
a  solid  substance,  or  that  a  faint  hue  indicates  that  the  object  in  which 
it  appears  is  far  away.  The  whole  technical  power  of  painting  depends 
on  our  recovery  of  what  may  be  called  the  innocence  of  the  eye ;  that  is 
to  say,  a  sort  of  childish  perception  of  these  flat  stains  of  colour,  merely 
as  such,  without  consciousness  of  what  they  signify,  as  a  blind  man 
would  see  them  if  suddenly  gifted  with  sight. 

For  instance  ;  when  grass  is  lighted  strongly  by  the  sun  in  certain 
directions,  it  is  turned  from  green  into  a  peculiar  and  somewhat  dusty- 
looking  yellow.  If  we  had  been  born  blind,  and  were  suddenly  en- 
dowed with  sight  on  a  piece  of  grass  thus  lighted  in  some  parts  by  the 
sun,  it  would  appear  to  us  that  part  of  the  grass  was  green,  and  part 
a  dusty  yellow  (very  nearly  of  the  colour  of  primroses) ;  and,  if  there 
were  primroses  near,  we  should  think  that  the  sunlighted  grass  was  an- 
other mass  of  plants  of  the  same  sulphur-yellow  colour.    We  should  try 


238 


THE  ELEMENTS  OF  DUA  WING. 


colour  have  an  appearance  of  lines  or  texture  within  them,  as 
a  piece  of  cloth  or  slik  has  of  threads,  or  an  animal's  skin 
shows  texture  of  hairs  ;  but  whether  this  be  the  case  or  not, 
the  first  broad  aspect  of  the  thing  is  that  of  a  patch  of  some 
definite  colour  ;  and  the  first  thing  to  be  learned  is,  how  to 
produce  extents  of  smooth  colour,  without  texture. 

This  can  only  be  done  properly  with  a  brush  ;  but  a  brush, 
being  soft  at  the  point,  causes  so  much  uncertainty  in  the 
touch  of  an  unpractised  hand,  that  it  is  hardly  possible  to 
learn  to  draw  first  with  it,  and  it  is  better  to  take,  in  early 
practice,  some  instrument  with  a  hard  and  fine  point,  both 
that  we  may  give  some  support  to  the  hand,  and  that  by  work- 
ing over  the  subject  with  so  delicate  a  point,  the  attention  may 
be  properly  directed  to  all  the  most  minute  parts  of  it;  Even 

to  gather  some  of  them,  and  then  find  that  the  colour  went  away  from 
the  grass  when  we  stood  between  it  and  the  sun,  but  not  from  the  prim- 
roses ;  and  by  a  series  of  experiments  we  should  find  out  that  the  sun 
was  really  the  cause  of  the  colour  in  the  one, — not  in  the  other.  We 
go  through  such  processes  of  experiment  unconsciously  in  childhood  ; 
and  having  once  come  to  conclusions  touching  the  signification  of  certain 
colours,  we  always  suppose  that  we  see  what  we  only  know,  and  have 
hardly  any  consciousness  of  the  real  aspect  of  the  signs  we  have  learned 
to  interpret.  Very  few  people  have  any  idea  that  sunlighted  grass  is 
yellow. 

Now,  a  highly  accomplished  artist  has  always  reduced  himself  as 
nearly  as  possible  to  this  condition  of  infantine  sight.  He  sees  the  col- 
ours of  nature  exactly  as  they  are,  and  therefore  perceives  at  once  in 
the  sunlighted  grass  the  precise  relation  between  the  two  colours  that 
form  its  shade  aud  light.  To  him  it  does  not  seem  shade  and  light,  but 
bluish  green  barred  with  gold. 

Strive,  therefore,  first  of  all,  to  convince  yourself  of  this  great  fact 
about  sight.  This,  in  your  hand,  which  you  know  by  experience  and 
touch  to  be  a  book,  is  to  your  eye  nothing  but  a  patch  of  white,  vari- 
ously gradated  and  spotted ;  this  other  thing  near  you,  which  by  expe- 
rience you  know  to  be  a  table,  is  to  your  eye  only  a  patch  of  brown, 
variously  darkened  and  veined  ;  and  so  on  :  and  the  whole  art  of  Paint- 
ing consists  merely  in  perceiving  the  shape  and  depth  of  these  patches 
of  colour,  and  putting  patches  of  the  same  size,  depth,  and  shape  on  ean^ 
vas.  The  only  obstacle  to  the  success  of  painting  is,  that  many  of  the 
real  colours  are  brighter  and  paler  than  it  is  possible  to  put  on  canvas : 
we  must  put  darker  ones  to  represent  them. 


ON  FIRST  PRACTICE. 


237 


the  best  artists  need  occasionally  to  study  subjects  with  a 
pointed  instrument,  in  order  thus  to  discipline  their  atten- 
tion :  and  a  beginner  must  be  content  to  do  so  for  a  consider- 
able period. 

Also,  observe  that  before  we  trouble  ourselves  about  differ- 
ences of  colour,  we  must  be  able  to  lay  on  one  colour  properly, 
in  whatever  gradations  of  depth  and  whatever  shapes  we  want. 
We  will  try,  therefore,  first  to  lay  on  tints  or  patches  of  grey, 
of  whatever  depth  we  want,  with  a  pointed  instrument. 
Take  any  finely-pointed  steel  pen  (one  of  Gillott's  lithographic 
crow-quills  is  best),  and  a  piece  of  quite  smooth,  but  not  shin- 
ing, note-paper,  cream-laid,  and  get  some  ink  that  has  stood 
already  some  time  in  the  inkstand,  so  as  to  be  quite  black,  and 
as  thick  as  it  can  be  without  clogging  the  pen.  Take  a  rule, 
and  draw  four  straight  lines,  so  as  to  enclose  a  square  or 
nearly  a  square,  about  as  large  as  a,  Fig.  1.  I  say  nearly  a 
square,  because  it  does  not  in  the  least  matter  whether  it  is 
quite  square  or  not,  the  object  being  merely  to  get  a  space 
enclosed  by  straight  lines. 


Now,  try  to  fill  in  that  square  space  with  crossed  lines,  so 
completely  and  evenly  that  it  shall  look  like  a  square  patch  of 
grey  silk  or  cloth,  cut  out  and  laid  on  the  white  paper,  as  at  b. 
Cover  it  quickly,  first  with  straightish  lines,  in  any  direction 
you  like,  not  troubling  yourself  to  draw  them  much  closer  or 
neater  than  those  in  the  square  a.  Let  them  quite  dry  before 
retouching  them.  (If  you  draw  three  or  four  squares  side  by 
side,  you  may  always  be  going  on  with  one  while  the  others 
are  drying).  Then  cover  these  lines  with  others  in  a  different 
direction,  and  let  those  dry  ;  then  in  another  direction  still, 
and  let  those  dry.  Always  wait  long  enough  to  run  no  risk 
of  blotting,  and  then  draw  the  lines  as  quickly  as  you  can. 


b 


Fig.  1. 


238 


THE  ELEMENTS  OF  DRAWING. 


Each  ought  to  be  laid  on  as  swiftly  as  the  dash  of  the  pen  of  a 
good  writer  ;  but  if  you  try  to  reach  this  great  speed  at  first 
you  will  go  over  the  edge  of  the  square,  which  is  a  fault  in 
this  exercise.  Yet  it  is  better  to  do  so  now  and  then  than  to 
draw  the  lines  very  slowly  ;  for  if  you  do,  the  pen  leaves  a  lit- 
tle dot  of  ink  at  the  end  of  each  line,  and  these  dots  spoil 
your  work.  So  draw  each  line  quickly,  stopping  always  as 
nearly  as  you  can  at  the  edge  of  the  square.  The  ends  of  lines 
which  go  over  the  edge  are  afterwards  to  be  removed  with  the 
penknife,  but  not  till  you  have  done  the  whole  work,  other- 
wise }rou  roughen  the  paper,  and  the  next  line  that  goes  over 
the  edge  makes  a  blot. 

When  you  have  gone  over  the  whole  three  or  four  times, 
you  will  find  some  parts  of  the  square  look  darker  than  other 
parts.  Now  try  to  make  the  lighter  parts  as  dark  as  the  rest, 
so  that  the  whole  may  be  of  equal  depth  or  darkness.  You 
will  find,  on  examining  the  work,  that  where  it  looks  darkest 
the  lines  are  closest,  or  there  are  some  much  darker  lines, 
than  elsewhere  ;  therefore  you  must  put  in  other  lines,  or 
little  scratches  and  dots,  between  the  lines  in  the  paler  parts  ; 
and  where  there  are  very  conspicuous  dark  lines,  scratch  them 
out  lightly  with  the  penknife,  for  the  eye  must  not  be  attracted 
by  any  line  in  particular.  The  more  carefully  and  delicately 
you  fill  in  the  little  gaps  and  holes  the  better  ;  you  will  get  on 
faster  by  doing  two  or  three  squares  perfectly  than  a  great 
many  badly.  As  the  tint  gets  closer  and  begins  to  look  even, 
work  with  very  little  ink  in  your  pen,  so  as  hardly  to  make 
any  mark  on  the  paper  ;  and  at  last,  where  it  is  too  dark,  use 
the  edge  of  your  penknife  very  lightly,  and  for  some  time,  to 
wear  it  softly  into  an  even  tone.  You  will  find  that  the  great- 
est difficulty  consists  in  getting  evenness  :  one  bit  will  always 
look  darker  than  another  bit  of  your  square  ;  or  there  will  be 
a  granulated  and  sandy  look  over  the  whole.  When  you  find 
your  paper  quite  rough  and  in  a  mess,  give  it  up  and  begin 
another  square,  but  do  not  rest  satisfied  till  you  have  done 
your  best  with  every  square.  The  tint  at  last  ought  at  lead 
to  be  as  close  and  even  as  that  in  b,  Fig.  1.  You  will  find, 
however,  that  it  is  very  difficult  to  get  a  pale  tint  ;  because, 


ON  FIRST  PRACTICE. 


239 


naturally,  the  ink  lines  necessary  to  produce  a  close  tint  at  all, 
blacken  the  paper  more  than  you  want.  You  must  get  over 
this  difficulty  not  so  much  by  leaving  the  lines  wide  apart  as 
by  trying  to  draw  them  excessively  fine,  lightly  and  swiftly ; 
being  very  cautious  in  filling  in  ;  and,  at  last,  passing  the  pen- 
knife over  the  whole.  By  keeping  several  squares  in  progress 
at  one  time,  and  reserving  your  pen  for  the  light  one  just 
when  the  ink  is  nearly  exhausted,  you  may  get  on  better. 
The  paper  ought,  at  last,  to  look  lightly  and  evenly  toned  all 
over,  with  no  lines  distinctly  visible. 

EXERCISE  II. 

As  this  exercise  in  shading  is  very  tiresome,  it  will  be  well 
to  vary  it  by  proceeding  with  another  at  the  same  time.  The 
power  of  shading  rightly  depends  mainly  on  lightness  of  hand 
and  keenness  of  sight  ;  but  there  are  other  qualities  required 
in  drawing,  dependent  not  merely  on  lightness,  but  steadiness 
of  hand  ;  and  the  eye,  to  be  perfect  in  its  power,  must  be 
made  accurate  as  well  as  keen,  and  not  only  see  shrewdly,  but 
measure  justly. 

Possess  yourself,  therefore,  of  any  cheap  work  on  botany 
containing  outline  plates  of  leaves  and  flowers,  it  does  not 
matter  whether  bad  or  good  :  "  Baxter's  British  Flowering 
Plants  "  is  quite  good  enough.  Copy  any  of  the  simplest  out- 
lines, first  with  a  soft  pencil,  following  it,  by  the  eye,  as  nearly 
as  you  can  ;  if  it  does  not  look  right  in  proportions,  rub  out 
and  correct  it,  always  by  the  eye,  till  you  think  it  is  right  \ 
when  you  have  got  it  to  your  mind,  lay  tracing-paper  on  the 
book,  on  this  paper  trace  the  outline  you  have  been  copying, 
and  apply  it  to  your  own  ;  and  having  thus  ascertained  the 
faults,  correct  them  all  patiently,  till  you  have  got  it  as  nearly 
accurate  as  may  be.  Work  with  a  very  soft  pencil,  and  do  not 
rub  out  so  hard*  as  to  spoil  the  surface  of  your  paper  ;  never 

*  Stale  crumb  of  bread  is  better, if  you  are  making  a  delicate  drawing, 
than  India-rubber,  for  it  disturbs  the  surface  of  the  paper  less :  but  it 
crumbles  about  the  room  and  makes  a  mess;  and,  besides,  you  waste 
the  good  bread,  which  is  wrong  ;  and  your  drawing  will  not  for  a  long 


240 


THE  ELEMENTS  OF  DRAWING. 


mind  how  dirty  the  paper  gets,  but  do  not  roughen  it ;  and 
let  the  false  outlines  alone  where  they  do  not  really  interfere 
with  the  true  one.  It  is  a  good  thing  to  accustom  yourself  to 
hew  and  shape  your  drawing  out  of  a  dirty  piece  of  paper. 
When  you  have  got  it  as  right  as  you  can,  take  a  quill  pen, 
not  very  fine  at  the  point ;  rest  your  hand  on  a  book  about  an 
inch  and  a  half  thick,  so  as  to  hold  the  pen  long  ;  and  go  over 
your  pencil  outline  with  ink,  raising  your  pen  point  as  seldom 
as  possible,  and  never  leaning  more  heavily  on  one  part  of 
the  line  than  on  another.  In  most  outline  drawings  of  the 
present  day,  parts  of  the  curves  are  thickened  to  give  an  effect 
of  shade  ;  all  such  outlines  are  bad,  but  they  will  serve  well 
enough  for  your  exercises,  provided  you  do  not  imitate  this 
character  :  it  is  better,  however,  if  you  can,  to  choose  a 
book  of  pure  outlines.  It  does  not  in  the  least  matter 
whether  your  pen  outline  be  thin  or  thick  ;  but  it  matters 
greatly  that  it  should  be  equal,  not  heavier  in  one  place  than 
in  another.  The  power  to  be  obtained  is  that  of  drawing  an 
even  line  slowly  and  in  any  direction  ;  all  dashing  lines,  or 
approximations  to  penmanship,  are  bad.  The  pen  should,  as 
it  were,  walk  slowly  over  the  ground,  and  you  should  be  able 
at  any  moment  to  stop  it,  or  to  turn  it  in  any  other  direction, 
like  a  well-managed  horse. 

As  soon  as  you  can  copy  every  curve  sloichj  and  accurately, 
you  have  made  satisfactory  progress  ;  but  you  will  find  the 
difficulty  is  in  the  dowries*.  It  is  easy  to  draw  what  appears 
to  be  a  good  line  with  a  sweep  of  the  hand,  or  with  what  is 
called  freedom  ;  *  the  real  difficulty  and  masterliness  is  in 

while  be  worth  the  crumbs.  So  use  India-rubber  very  lightly  ;  or,  if 
heavily  pressing  it  only,  not  passing  it  over  the  paper,  and  leave  what 
pencil  marks  that  will  not  come  away  so,  without  minding  them.  In  a 
finished  drawing  the  uneffaced  penciling  is  often  serviceable,  helping 
ihe  general  tone,  and  enabling  you  to  take  out  little  bright  lights. 

*  What  is  usually  so  much  sought  after  under  the  term  ''freedom"  is 
the  character  of  the  drawing  of  a  great  master  in  a  hurry,  whose  hand 
is  so  thoroughly  disciplined,  that  when  pressed  for  time  he  can  let  it  lly 
as  it  will,  and  it  will  not  go  far  wrong.  But  the  hand  of  a  great  master 
at  real  work  is  never  free  :  its  swiftest  dash  is  under  perfect  government. 
Paul  Veronese  or  Tintoret  could  pause  within  a  hair's  breadth  of  any 


ON  FIRST  PRACTICE. 


241 


never  letting  the  hand  be  free,  but  keeping  it  under  entire 
control  at  every  part  of  the  line. 

EXERCISE  III. 

Meantime,  you  are  always  to  be  going  on  with  your  shaded 
squares,  and  chiefly  with  these,  the  outline  exercises  being 
taken  up  only  for  rest. 

As  soon  as  you  find  you  have  some  command  of  the  pen  as 
a  shading  instrument,  and  can  lay  a  pale  or  dark  tint  as  you 
choose,  try  to  produce  gradated  spaces  like  Fig.  2.,  the  dark 


Fig.  2. 


tint  passing  gradually  into  the  lighter  ones.  Nearly  all  ex- 
pression of  form,  in  drawing,  depends  on  your  power  of  gra- 
dating delicately  ;  and  the  gradation  is  always  most  skilful 
which  passes  from  one  tint  into  another  very  little  paler.  Draw, 
therefore,  two  parallel  lines  for  limits  to  your  work,  as  in  Fig. 
2.,  and  try  to  gradate  the  shade  evenly  from  white  to  black, 
passing  over  the  greatest  possible  distance,  yet  so  that  every 

appointed  mark,  in  their  fastest  touches  ;  and  follow,  within  a  hair's 
breadth,  the  previously  intended  curve.  You  must  never,  therefore, 
aim  at  freedom.  It  is  not  required  of  your  drawing  that  it  should  be 
free,  but  that  it  should  be  right:  in  time  you  will  be  able  to  do  right 
easily,  and  then  your  work  will  be  free  in  the  best  sense  ;  but  there  is 
no  merit  in  doing  wrong  easily. 

These  remarks,  however,  do  not  apply  to  the  lines  used  in  shading, 
which,  it  will  be  remembered,  are  to  be  made  as  quickly  as  possible. 
The  reason  of  this  is,  that  the  quicker  a  line  is  drawn,  the  lighter  it  is 
at  the  ends,  and  therefore  the  more  easily  joined  with  other  lines,  and 
concealed  by  them  ;  the  object  in  perfect  shading  being  to  conceal  the 
lines  as  much  as  possible. 

And  observe,  in  this  exercise,  the  object  is  more  to  get  firmness  of 
hand  than  accuracy  of  eye  for  outline  ;  for  there  are  no  outlines  in  Nat- 
ure, and  the  ordinary  student  is  sure  to  draw  them  falsely  if  he  draws 
them  at  all.  Do  not,  therefore,  he  discouraged  if  you  find  mistakes 
continue  to  occur  in  your  outlines  ;  bo  content  at  present  if  you  find  your 
hand  gaining  command  over  the  curve;-. 


242  THE  ELEMENTS  OF  DBA  WING. 

part  of  the  band  may  have  visible  change  in  it.  The  percep. 
tion  of  gradation  is  very  deficient  in  all  beginners  (not  to  say, 
in  many  artists),  and  you  will  probably,  for  some  time,  think 
your  gradation  skilful  enough  when  it  is  quite  patchy  and  im- 
perfect. By  getting  a  piece  of  grey  shaded  riband,  and  com- 
paring it  with  your  drawing,  you  may  arrive,  in  early  stages 
of  your  work,  at  a  wholesome  dissatisfaction  with  it.  Widen 
your  band  little  by  little  as  you  get  more  skilful,  so  as  to  give 
the  gradation  more  lateral  space,  and  accustom  yourself  at  the 
same  time  to  look  for  gradated  spaces  in  Nature.  The  sky  is 
the  largest  and  the  most  beautiful ;  watch  it  at  twilight,  after 
the  sun  is  down,  and  try  to  consider  each  pane  of  glass  in  the 
window  you  look  through  as  a  piece  of  paper  coloured  blue, 
or  grey,  or  purple,  as  it  happens  to  be,  and  observe  how  quietly 
and  continuously  the  gradation  extends  over  the  space  in  the 
window,  of  one  or  two  feet  square.  Observe  the  shades  on 
the  outside  and  inside  of  a  common  white  cup  or  bowl,  which 
make  it  look  round  and  hollow  ;'*  and  then  on  folds  of  white 
drapery  ;  and  thus  gradually  you  will  be  led  to  observe  the 
more  subtle  transitions  of  the  light  as  it  increases  or  declines 
on  flat  surfaces.  At  last,  when  your  eye  gets  keen  and  true, 
you  will  see  gradation  on  everything  in  Nature. 

But  it  will  not  be  in  your  power  yet  awhile  to  draw  from 
any  objects  in  which  the  gradations  are  varied  and  compli- 
cated ;  nor  will  it  be  a  bad  omen  for  your  future  progress,  and 
for  the  use  that  art  is  to  be  made  of  by  you,  if  the  first  thing 
at  which  you  aim  should  be  a  little  bit  of  sky.  So  take  any 
narrow  space  of  evening  sky,  that  you  can  usually  see,  between 
the  boughs  of  a  tree,  or  between  two  chimneys,  or  through 
the  corner  of  a  pane  in  the  window  you  like  best  to  sit  at,  and 
try  to  gradate  a  little  space  of  white  paper  as  evenly  as  that 
is  gradated — as  tenderly  you  cannot  gradate  it  without  colour, 
no,  nor  with  colour  either ;  but  you  may  do  it  as  evenly  ;  or, 
if  you  get  impatient  with  your  spots  and  lines  of  ink,  when 
you  look  at  the  beauty  of  the  sky,  the  sense  you  will  have 
gained  of  that  beauty  is  something  to  be  thankful  for.  But 

*  If  you  can  get  any  pieces  of  dead  white  porcelain,  not  glazed,  they 
will  be  useful  models. 


ON  FIRST  PRACTICE. 


243 


you  ought  not  to  be  impatient  with  your  pen  and  ink  ;  for  all 
great  painters,  however  delicate  their  perception  of  colour,  are 
fond  of  the  peculiar  effect  of  light  which  may  be  got  in  a  pen- 
and-ink  sketch,  and  in  a  woodcut,  by  the  gleaming  of  the  white 
paper  between  the  black  lines  ;  and  if  you  cannot  gradate  well 
with  pure  black  lines,  you  will  never  gradate  well  with  pale 
ones.  By  looking  at  any  common  woodcuts,  in  the  cheap 
publications  of  the  day,  you  may  see  how  gradation  is  given 
to  the  sky  by  leaving  the  lines  farther  and  farther  apart ;  but 
you  must  make  your  lines  as  fine  as  you  can,  as  well  as  far 
apart,  towards  the  light ;  and  do  not  try  to  make  them  long 
or  straight,  but  let  them  cross  irregularly  in  any  direction  easy 
to  your  hand,  depending  on  nothing  but  their  gradation  for 
your  effect.  On  this  point  of  direction  of  lines,  however,  I 
shall  have  to  tell  you  more  presently  ;  in  the  meantime,  do  not 
trouble  yourself  about  it. 

EXERCISE  IV. 

As  soon  as  you  find  you  can  gradate  tolerably  with  the  pen, 
take  an  H.  or  HH.  pencil,  using  its  point  to  produce  shade, 
from  the  darkest  possible  to  the  palest,  in  exactly  the  same 
manner  as  the  pen,  lightening,  however,  now  with  India-rubber 
instead  of  the  penknife.  You  will  find  that  ail  pale  tints  of 
shade  are  thus  easily  producible  with  great  precision  and  ten- 
derness, but  that  you  cannot  get  the  same  dark  power  as  with 
the  pen  and  ink,  and  that  the  surface  of  the  shade  is  apt  to 
become  glossy  and  metallic,  or  dirty -looking,  or  sandy.  Perse- 
vere, however,  in  trying  to  bring  it  to  evenness  with  the  fine 
point,  removing  any  single  speck  or  line  that  may  be  too  black, 
with  the  point  of  the  knife  :  you  must  not  scratch  the  whole 
with  the  knife  as  you  do  the  ink.  If  you  find  the  texture  very 
speckled- looking,  lighten  it  all  over  with  India-rubber,  and 
recover  it  again  with  sharp,  and  excessively  fine  touches  of  the 
pencil  point,  bringing  the  parts  that  are  too  pale  to  perfect 
evenness  with  the  darker  spots. 

You  cannot  use  the  point  too  delicately  or  cunningly  in 
doing  this  ;  work  with  it  as  if  you  were  drawing  the  down  on 
a  butterfly's  wing. 


244 


THE  ELEMENTS  OF  Bit  A  WING. 


At  this  stage  of  your  progress,  if  not  before,  you  may  be 
assured  that  some  clever  friend  will  come  in,  and  hold  up  his 
hands  in  mocking  amazement,  and  ask  you  who  could  set  you 
to  that  "  niggling  ; "  and  if  you  persevere  in  it,  you  will  have  to 
sustain  considerable  persecution  from  your  artistical  acquaint- 
ances generally,  who  will  tell  you  that  all  good  drawing  de- 
pends on  "  boldness."  But  never  mind  them.  You  do  not 
hear  them  tell  a  child,  beginning  music,  to  lay  its  little  hand 
with  a  crash  among  the  keys,  in  imitation  of  the  great  mas- 
ters ;  yet  they  might,  as  reasonably  as  they  may  tell  you  to  be 
bold  in  the  present  state  of  your  knowledge.  Bold,  in  the 
sense  of  being  undaunted,  yes  ;  but  bold  in  the  sense  of  being 
careless,  confident,  or  exhibitory, —  no, —  no,  and  a  thousand 
times  no  ;  for,  even  if  you  were  not  a  beginner,  it  would  be 
bad  advice  that  made  you  bold.  Mischief  may  easily  be  done 
quickly,  but  good  and  beautiful  work  is  generally  done  slowly; 
you  will  find  no  boldness  in  the  way  a  flower  or  a  bird's  wing- 
is  painted  ;  and  if  Nature  is  not  bold  at  her  work,  do  you 
think  you  ought  to  be  at  yours  f  So  never  mind  what  people 
say,  but  wTork  with  your  pencil  point  very  patiently ;  and  if 
you  can  trust  me  in  anything,  trust  me  when  I  tell  you,  that 
though  there  are  all  kinds  and  ways  of  art, — large  work  for 
large  places,  small  work  for  narrow  places,  slow  work  for 
people  who  can  wait,  and  quick  work  for  people  who  cannot, 
— there  is  one  quality,  and,  I  think,  only  one,  in  which  all 
great  and  good  art  agrees  ; — it  is  all  delicate  art.  Coarse  art 
is  always  bad  art.  You  cannot  understand  this  at  present, 
because  you  do  not  know  yet  how  much  tender  thought,  and 
subtle  care,  the  great  painters  put  into  touches  that  at  first 
look  coarse  ;  but,  believe  me,  it  is  true,  and  you  will  find  it 
is  so  in  due  time. 

You  will  be  perhaps  also  troubled,  in  these  first  essays  at 
pencil  drawing,  by  noticing  that  more  delicate  gradations 
are  got  in  an  instant  by  a  chance  touch  of  the  India-rubber, 
than  by  an  hour's  labour  with  the  point ;  and  you  may  won- 
der why  I  tell  you  to  produce  tints  so  painfully,  which  might, 
it  appears,  be  obtained  with  ease.  But  there  are  two  reasons : 
the  first,  that  when  you  come  to  draw  forms,  you  must  be 


ON  FIRST  PRACTICE. 


245 


able  to  gradate  with  absolute  precision,  in  whatever  place  and 
direction  you  wish  ;  not  in  any  wise  vaguely,  as  the  India-rub- 
ber does  it ;  and,  secondly,  that  all  natural  shadows  are  more 
or  less  mingled  with  gleams  of  light.  In  the  darkness  of 
ground  there  is  the  light  of  the  little  pebbles  or  dust ;  in  the 
darkness  of  foliage,  the  glitter  of  the  leaves  ;  in  the  darkness 
of  flesh,  transparency  ;  in  that  of  a  stone,  granulation  :  in 
every  case  there  is  some  mingling  of  light,  which  cannot  be 
represented  by  the  leaden  tone  wdiich  you  get  by  rubbing,  or 
by  an  instrument  known  to  artists  as  the  "  stump."  When 
you  can  manage  the  point  properly,  you  will  indeed  be  able 
to  do  much  also  with  this  instrument,  or  with  your  fingers ; 
but  then  you  will  have  to  retouch  the  flat  tints  afterwards,  so 
as  to  put  life  and  light  into  them,  and  that  can  only  be  done 
with  the  point.  Labour  on,  therefore,  courageously,  with  that 
only. 


When  you  can  manage  to  tint  and  gradate  tenderly  with 
the  pencil  point,  get  a  good  large  alphabet,  and  try  to  tint  the 
letters  into  shape  with  the  pencil  point.  Do  not  outline  them 
first,  but  measure  their  height  and  extreme  breadth  with  the 


compasses,  as  a  b,  a  c,  Fig.  3.,  and  then  scratch  in  their  shapes 
gradually  ;  the  letter  A,  enclosed  within  the  lines,  being  in 
what  Turner  would  have  called  a  "  state  of  forwardness." 
Then,  when  you  are  satisfied  with  the  shape  of  the  letter, 
draw  pen  and  ink  lines  firmly  round  the  tint,  as  at  d,  and  re- 


EXERCISE  V. 


V 


Fig.  3. 


246 


THE  ELEMENTS  OF  DRAWING, 


move  any  touches  outside  the  limit,  first  with  the  India-rub- 
ber, and  then  with  the  penknife,  so  that  all  may  look  clear  and 
right.  If  you  rub  out  any  of  the  pencil  inside  the  outline  of 
the  letter,  retouch  it,  closing  it  up  to  the  inked  line.  The 
straight  lines  of  the  outline  are  all  to  be  ruled  *  but  the  curved 
lines  are  to  be  drawn  by  the  eye  and  hand  ;  and  you  will  soon 
find  what  good  practice  there  is  in  getting  the  curved  letters, 
such  as  Bs,  Cs,  &c,  to  stand  quite  straight,  and  come  into 
accurate  form. 

All  these  exercises  are  very  irksome,  and  they  are  not  to  be 
persisted  in  alone ;  neither  is  it  necessary  to  acquire  perfect 
power  in  any  of  them.  An  entire  master  of  the  pencil  or 
brush  ought,  indeed,  to  be  able  to  draw  any  form  at  once,  as 
Giotto  his  circle  ;  but  such  skill  as  this  is  only  to  be  expected 
of  the  consummate  master,  having  pencil  in  hand  all  his  life, 
and  all  day  long,  hence  the  force  of  Giotto's  proof  of  his  skill ; 
and  it  is  quite  possible  to  draw  very  beautifully,  without  at- 
taining even  an  approximation  to  such  a  power ;  the  main 
point  being,  not  that  every  line  should  be  precisely  what  we 
intend  or  wish,  but  that  the  line  which  we  intended  or  wished 
to  draw  should  be  right.  If  we  alwTays  see  rightly  and  mean 
rightly,  we  shall  get  on,  though  the  hand  may  stagger  a  little  ; 
but  if  we  mean  wTrongry,  or  mean  nothing,  it  does  not  matter 
how  firm  the  hand  is.  Do  not,  therefore,  torment  yourself 
because  you  cannot  do  as  well  as  you  would  like  ;  but  work 
patiently,  sure  that  every  square  and  letter  will  give  you  a 
certain  increase  of  power  ;  and  as  soon  as  you  can  draw  your 
letters  pretty  well,  here  is  a  more  amusing  exercise  for  you. 

*  Artists  who  glance  at  this  book  may  be  surprised  at  this  permission. 
My  chief  reason  is,  that  I  think  it  more  necessary  that  the  pupil's  eye 
should  be  trained  to  accurate  perception  of  the  relations  of  curve  and 
right  lines,  by  having  the  latter  absolutely  true,  than  that  he  should 
practice  drawing  straight  lines.  But  also,  1  believe,  though  I  am  not 
quite  sure  of  this,  that  he  never  ought  to  be  able  to  draw  a  straight  line. 
I  do  not  believe  a  perfectly  trained  hand  ever  can  draw  a  line  without 
some  curvature  in  it,  or  some  variety  of  direction.  Prout  could  draw 
a  straight  line,  but  I  do  not  believe  Raphael  could,  nor  Tintoret.  A 
great  draughtsman  can,  as  far  as  I  have  observed,  draw  every  line  but  a 
Straight  one. 


ON  FIRST  PRACTICE, 


247 


EXERCISE  VI. 

Choose  any  tree  that  you  think  pretty,  which  is  nearly  bare 
of  leaves,  and  which  you  can  see  against  the  sky,  or  against  a 
pale  wall,  or  other  light  ground  :  it  must  not  be  against  strong 
light,  or  you  will  find  the  looking  at  it  hurts  your  eyes  ;  nor 
must  it  be  in  sunshine,  or  you  will  be  puzzled  by  the  lights  on 
the  boughs.  But  the  tree  must  be  in  shade  ;  and  the  sky 
blue,  or  grey,  or  dull  white.  A  wiiolly  grey  or  rainy  day  is 
the  best  for  this  practice. 

You  will  see  that  all  the  boughs  of  the  tree  are  dark  against 
the  sky.  Consider  them  as  so  many  dark  rivers,  to  be  laid 
down  in  a  map  with  absolute  accuracy  ;  and,  without  the  least 
thought  about  the  roundness  of  the  stems,  map  them  all  out 
in  flat  shade,  scrawling  them  in  with  pencil,  just  as  you  did 
the  limbs  of  your  letters ;  then  correct  and  alter  them,  rub- 
bing out  and  out  again,  never  minding  how  much  your  paper 
is  dirtied  (only  not  destroying  its  surface),  until  every  bough 
is  exactly,  or  as  near  as  your  utmost  power  can  bring  it,  right 
in  curvature  and  in  thickness.  Look  at  the  white  interstices 
between  them  with  as  much  scrupulousness  as  if  they  were 
little  estates  which  you  had  to  survey,  and  draw  maps  of,  for 
some  important  lawsuit,  involving  heavy  penalties  if  you  cut 
the  least  bit  of  a  corner  off  any  of  them,  or  gave  the  hedge 
anywhere  too  deep  a  curve  ;  and  try  continually  to  fancy  the 
whole  tree  nothing  but  a  flat  ramification  on  a  white  ground. 
Do  not  take  any  trouble  about  the  little  twigs,  which  look  like 
a  confused  network  or  mist ;  leave  them  all  out  *  drawing 
only  the  main  branches  as  far  as  you  can  see  them  distinctly, 
your  object  at  present  being  not  to  draw  a  tree,  but  to  learn 
how  to  do  so.  When  you  have  got  the  thing  as  nearly  right 
as  you  can — and  it  is  better  to  make  one  good  study  than 
twenty  left  unnecessarily  inaccurate — take  your  pen,  and  put  a 
fine  outline  to  all  the  boughs,  as  you  did  to  your  letter,  taking 

*  Or,  if  you  feel  able  to  do  so,  scratch  them  in  with  confused  quick 
touches,  indicating  the  general  shape  of  the  cloud  or  mist  of  twigs 
round  the  main  branches  ;  but  do  not  take  much  trouble  about  them. 


248 


THE  ELEMENTS  OF  DRAWING. 


care,  as  far  as  possible,  to  put  the  outline  within  the  edge  of 
the  shade,  so  as  not  to  make  the  boughs  thicker :  the  main 
use  of  the  outline  is  to  affirm  the  whole  more  clearly  ;  to  do 
away  with  little  accidental  roughnesses  and  excrescences,  and 
especially  to  mark  where  boughs  cross,  or  come  in  front  of 
each  other,  as  at  such  points  their  arrangement  in  this  kind 
of  sketch  is  unintelligible  without  the  outline.  It  may  per- 
fectly well  happen  that  in  Nature  it  should  be  less  distinct 


Fig.  4. 


than  your  outline  will  make  it ;  but  it  is  better  in  this  kind  of 
sketch  to  mark  the  facts  clearly.  The  temptation  is  always  to 
be  slovenly  and  careless,  and  the  outline  is  like  a  bridle,  and 
forces  our  indolence  into  attention  and  precision.  The  out- 
line should  be  about  the  thickness  of  that  in  Fig.  4.,  which 
represents  the  ramification  of  a  small  stone  pine,  only  I  have 
not  endeavoured  to  represent  the  pencil  shading  within  the 
outline,  as  I  could  not  easily  express  it  in  a  woodcut ;  and  you 
have  nothing  to  do  at  present  with  the  indication  of  the  foli- 
age above,  of  which  in  another  place.    You  may  also  draw 


ON  FIRST  PRACTICE. 


249 


your  trees  as  much  larger  than  this  figure  as  you  like  ;  only, 
however  large  they  may  be,  keep  the  outline  as  delicate,  and 
draw  the  branches  far  enough  into  their  outer  sprays  to  give 
quite  as  slender  ramification  as  you  have  in  this  figure,  other- 
wise you  do  not  get  good  enough  practice  out  of  them. 

You  cannot  do  too  many  studies  of  this  kind  :  every  one 
will  give  you  some  new  notion  about  trees  :  but  when  you 
are  tired  of  tree  boughs,  take  any  forms  whatever  which  are 
drawn  in  flat  colour,  one  upon  another ;  as  patterns  on  any 
kind  of  cloth,  or  flat  china  (tiles,  for  instance),  executed  in 
two  colours  only ;  and  practice  drawing  them  of  the  right 
shape  and  size  by  the  eye,  and  filling  them  in  with  shade  of 
the  depth  required. 

In  doing  this,  you  will  first  have  to  meet  the  difficulty  of 
representing  depth  of  colour  by  depth  of  shade.  Thus  a  pat- 
tern of  ultramarine  blue  will  have  to  be  represented  by  a 
darker  tint  of  grey  than  a  pattern  of  yellow. 

And  now  it  is  both  time  for  you  to  begin  to  learn  the  me- 
chanical use  of  the  brush,  and  necessary  for  you  to  do  so  in 
order  to  provide  yourself  with  the  gradated  scale  of  colour 
which  you  will  want.  If  you  can,  by  any  means,  get  acquainted 
with  any  ordinarily  skilful  water-colour  painter,  and  prevail 
on  him  to  show  you  how  to  lay  on  tints  with  a  brush,  by  all 
means  do  so  ;  not  that  you  are  yet,  nor  for  a  long  while  yet, 
to  begin  to  colour,  but  because  the  brush  is  often  more  con- 
venient than  the  pencil  for  laying  on  masses  or  tints  of  shade, 
and  the  sooner  you  know  how  to  manage  it  as  an  instrument 
the  better.  If,  however,  you  have  no  opportunity  of  seeing 
how  water-colour  is  laid  on  by  a  workman  of  any  kind,  the 
following  directions  will  help  you  : — 

EXERCISE  VII. 

Get  a  shilling  cake  of  Prussian  blue.  Dip  the  end  of  it  in 
water  so  as  to  take  up  a  drop,  and  rub  it  in  a  wrhite  saucer 
till  you  cannot  rub  much  more,  and  the  colour  gets  dark, 
thick,  and  oily-looking.  Put  two  teaspoonfuls  of  water  to  the 
colour  you  have  rubbed  down,  and  mix  it  well  up  with  a 
camel's-hair  brush  about  three  quarters  of  an  inch  long. 


250 


THE  ELEMENTS  OF  BRA  WING. 


Then  take  a  piece  of  smooth,  but  not  glossy,  Bristol  board 
or  pasteboard  ;  divide  it,  with  your  pencil  and  rule,  into 
squares  as  large  as  those  of  the  very  largest  chess-board  :  they 
need  not  be  perfect  squares,  only  as  nearly  so  as  you  can 
quickly  guess.  Rest  the  pasteboard  on  something  sloping  as 
much  as  an  ordinary  desk  ;  then,  dipping  your  brush  into  the 
colour  you  have  mixed,  and  taking  up  as  much  of  the  liquid 
as  it  will  carry,  begin  at  the  top  of  one  of  the  squares,  and 
lay  a  pond  or  runlet  of  colour  along  the  top  edge.  Lead  this 
pond  of  colour  gradually  downwards,  not  faster  at  one  place 
than  another,  but  as  if  you  were  adding  a  row  of  bricks  to  a 
building,  all  along  (only  building  down  instead  of  up),  dip- 
ping the  brush  frequently  so  as  to  keep  the  colour  as  full  in 
that,  and  in  as  great  quantity  on  the  paper,  as  you  can,  so 
only  that  it  does  not  run  down  anywhere  in  a  little  stream. 
But  if  it  should,  never  mind  ;  go  on  quietly  with  your  square 
till  you  have  covered  it  all  in.  When  you  get  to  the  bottom, 
the  colour  will  lodge  there  in  a  great  wave.  Have  ready  a 
piece  of  blotting-paper  ;  dry  your  brush  on  it,  and  with  the 
dry  brush  take  up  the  superfluous  colour  as  you  would  with  a 
sponge,  till  it  all  looks  even. 

In  leading  the  colour  down,  you  will  find  your  brush  con- 
tinually go  over  the  edge  of  the  square,  or  leave  little  gaps 
within  it.  Do  not  endeavour  to  retouch  these,  nor  take  much 
care  about  them  ;  the  great  thing  is  to  get  the  colour  to  lie 
smoothly  where  it  reaches,  not  in  alternate  blots  and  pale 
patches ;  try,  therefore,  to  lead  it  over  the  square  as  fast  as 
possible,  with  such  attention  to  your  limit  as  you  are  able  to 
give.  The  use  of  the  exercise  is,  indeed,  to  enable  you  finally 
to  strike  the  colour  up  to  the  limit  with  perfect  accuracy ;  but 
the  first  thing  is  to  get  it  even,  the  power  of  rightly  striking 
the  edge  comes  only  by  time  and  practice  ;  even  the  greatest 
artists  rarely  can  do  this  quite  perfectly. 

When  you  have  done  one  square,  proceed  to  do  another 
which  does  not  communicate  with  it.  When  you  have  thus 
done  all  the  alternate  squares,  as  on  a  chess-board,  turn  the 
pasteboard  upside  down,  begin  again  with  the  first,  and  put 
another  coat  over  it,  and  so  on  over  all  the  others.    The  use 


ON  FIRST  PRACTICE. 


251 


of  turning  the  paper  upside  down  is  to  neutralise  the  increase 
of  darkness  towards  the  bottom  of  the  squares,  which  would 
otherwise  take  place  from  the  ponding  of  the  colour. 

Be  resolved  to  use  blotting-paper,  or  a  piece  of  rag,  instead 
of  your  lips,  to  dry  the  brush.  The  habit  of  doing  so,  once 
acquired,  will  save  you  from  much  partial  poisoning.  Take 
care,  however,  always  to  draw  the  brush  from  root  to  point, 
otherwise  you  will  spoil  it.  You  may  even  wipe  it  as  you 
would  a  pen  when  you  want  it  very  dry,  without  doing  harm, 
provided  you  do  not  crush  it  upwards.  Get  a  good  brush  at 
first,  and  cherish  it ;  it  will  serve  you  longer  and  better  than 
many  bad  ones. 

When  you  have  done  the  squares  all  over  again,  do  them  a 
third  time,  always  trying  to  keep  your  edges  as  neat  as  possi- 
ble. When  your  colour  is  exhausted,  mix  more  in  the  same 
proportions,  two  teaspoonfuls  to  as  much  as  you  can  grind 
with  a  drop  ;  and  when  you  have  done  the  alternate  squares 
three  times  over,  as  the  paper  will  be  getting  very  damp,  and 
dry  more  slowly,  begin  on  the  white  squares,  and  bring  them 
up  to  the  same  tint  in  the  same  way.  The  amount  of  jagged 
dark  line  which  then  will  mark  the  limits  of  the  squares  will 
be  the  exact  measure  of  your  unskilfulness. 

As  soon  as  you  tire  of  squares  draw  circles  (with  com- 
passes) ;  and  then  draw  straight  lines  irregularly  across  cir- 
cles, and  fill  up  the  spaces  so  produced  between  the  straight 
line  and  the  circumference  ;  and  then  draw  any  simple  shapes 
of  leaves,  according  to  the  exercise  No.  2.,  and  fill  up  those, 
until  you  can  lay  on  colour  quite  evenly  in  any  shape  you 
want. 

You  will  find  in  the  course  of  this  practice,  as  you  cannot 
always  put  exactly  the  same  quantity  of  water  to  the  colour, 
that  the  darker  the  colour  is,  the  more  difficult  it  becomes 
to  lay  it  on  evenly.  Therefore,  when  yon  have  gained  some 
definite  degree  of  power,  try  to  fill  in  the  forms  required  witli 
a  full  brush,  and  a  dark  tint,  at  once,  instead  of  laying  several 
coats  one  over  another ;  always  taking  care  that  the  tint,  how- 
ever dark,  be  quite  liquid  ;  and  that,  after  being  laid  on,  so 
much  of  it  is  absorbed  as  to  prevent  its  forming  a  black  line 


252 


THE  ELEMENTS  OF  J)  11 A  WING. 


at  the  edge  as  it  dries.  A  little  experience  will  teach  you  how 
apt  the  colour  is  to  do  this,  and  how  to  prevent  it ;  not  that  it 
needs  always  to  be  prevented,  for  a  great  master  in  water- 
colours  will  sometimes  draw  a  firm  outline,  when  he  wants 
one,  simply  by  letting  the  colour  dry  in  this  way  at  the 
edge. 

When,  however,  you  begin  to  cover  complicated  forms  with 
the  darker  colour,  no  rapidity  will  prevent  the  tint  from  dry- 
ing irregularly  as  it  is  led  on  from  part  to  part.  You  will  then 
.find  the  following  method  useful.  Lay  in  the  colour  very 
pale  nnd  liquid  ;  so  pale,  indeed,  that  you  can  only  just  see 
where  it  is  on  the  paper.  Lead  it  up  to  all  the  outlines,  and 
make  it  precise  in  form,  keeping  it  thoroughly  wet  every- 
where. Then,  when  it  is  ail  in  shape,  take  the  darker  colour, 
and  lay  some  of  it  into  the  middle  of  the  liquid  colour.  It  will 
spread  gradually  in  a  branchy  kind  of  way,  and  you  may  now 
lead  it  up  to  the  outlines  already  determined,  and  play  it  wTith 
the  brush  till  it  fills  its  place  well  ;  then  let  it  dry,  and  it  will 
be  as  flat  and  pure  as  a  single  dash,  yet  defining  all  the  com- 
plicated forms  accurately. 

Having  thus  obtained  the  power  of  laying  on  a  tolerably 
fiat  tint,  you  must  try  to  lay  on  a  gradated  one.  Prepare  the 
colour  with  three  or  four  teaspoonfuls  of  water  ;  then,  when  it 
is  mixed,  pour  away  about  two-thirds  of  it,  keeping  a  teaspoon - 
ful  of  pale  colour.  Sloping  your  paper  as  before,  draw  two 
pencil  lines  all  the  way  down,  leaving  a  space  between  them  of 
the  width  of  a  square  on  your  chess-board.  Begin  at  the  top 
of  your  paper,  between  the  lines  ;  and  having  struck  on  the 
first  brushful  of  colour,  and  led  it  clown  a  little,  dip  your 
brush  deep  in  water,  and  mix  up  the  colour  on  the  plate 
quickly  with  as  much  more  water  as  the  brush  takes  up  at 
that  one  dip :  then,  with  this  paler  colour,  lead  the  tint 
farther  down.  Dip  in  water  again,  mix  the  colour  again,  and 
thus  lead  down  the  tint,  always  dipping  in  water  once  between 
each  replenishing  of  the  brush,  and  stirring  the  colour  on  the 
plate  well,  but  as  quickly  as  you  can.  Go  on  until  the  colour 
has  become  so  pale  that  you  cannot  see  it  ;  then  wash  your 
brush  thoroughly  in  water,  and  carry  the  wave  down  a  little 


ON  FIRST  PRACTICE. 


253 


farther  with  that,  and  then  absorb  it  with  the  dry  brush,  and 
leave  it  to  dry. 

If  you  get  to  the  bottom  of  your  paper  before  your  colour 
gets  pale,  you  may  either  take  longer  paper,  or  begin,  with 
the  tint  as  it  was  when  you  left  off,  on  another  sheet ;  but  be 
sure  to  exhaust  it  to  pure  whiteness  at  last.  When  all  is 
quite  dry,  recommence  at  the  top  with  another  similar  mixt- 
ure of  colour,  and  go  down  in  the  same  way.  Then  again, 
and  then  again,  and  so  continually  until  the  colour  at  the  top 
of  the  paper  is  as  dark  as  your  cake  of  Prussian  blue,  and 
passes  down  into  pure  white  paper  at  the  end  of  your  column, 
with  a  perfectly  smooth  gradation  from  one  into  the  other. 

You  will  find  at  first  that  the  paper  gets  mottled  or  wavy, 
instead  of  evenly  gradated  ;  this  is  because  at  some  places  you 
have  taken  up  more  water  in  your  brush  than  at  others,  or 
not  mixed  it  thoroughly  on  the  plate,  or  led  one  tint  too  far 
before  replenishing  with  the  next.  Practice  only  will  enable 
you  to  do  it  well ;  the  best  artists  cannot  always  get  grada- 
tions of  this  kind  quite  to  their  minds  ;  nor  do  they  ever  leave 
them  on  their  pictures  without  after  touching. 

As  you  get  more  power,  and  can  strike  the  colour  more 
quickly  down,  you  will  be  able  to  gradate  in  less  compass  ;  * 
beginning  with  a  small  quantity  of  colour,  and  adding  a  drop 
of  water,  instead  of  a  brushful  ;  with  finer  brushes,  also,  you 
may  gradate  to  a  less  scale.  But  slight  skill  will  enable  you 
to  test  the  relations  of  colour  to  shade  as  far  as  is  necessary 
for  your  immediate  progress,  which  is  to  be  done  thus  : — 

Take  cakes  of  lake,  of  gamboge,  of  sepia,  of  blue-black,  of 
cobalt,  and  vermilion  ;  and  prepare  gradated  columns  (exactly 
as  you  have  done  with  the  Prussian  blue)  of  the  lake  and 
blue-black. f  Cut  a  narrow  slip  all  the  way  down,  of  each  gra- 
dated colour,  and  set  the  three  slips  side  by  side ;  fasten  them 
down,  and  rule  lines  at  equal  distances  across  all  the  three,  so 
as  to  divide  them  into  fifty  degrees,  and  number  the  degrees 

*  It  is  more  difficult,  at  first,  to  get,  in  colour,  a  narrow  gradation  than 
an  extended  one  ;  but  the  ultimate  difficulty  is,  as  with  the  pen,  to  make 
the  gradation  go  far. 

\  Of  course,  all  the  columns  of  colour  are  to  be  of  equal  length. 


254 


THE  ELEMENTS  OF  DRAWING. 


of  each,  from  light  to  dark,  1,  2,  3,  &c.  If  you  have  gradated 
them  rightly,  the  darkest  part  either  of  the  red  or  blue  will 
be  nearly  equal  in  power  to  the  darkest  part  of  the  blue-black, 
and  any  degree  of  the  black  slip  will  also,  accurately  enough 
for  our  purpose,  balance  in  weight  the  degree  similarly  num- 
bered in  the  red  or  the  blue  slip.  Then,  when  you  are  draw- 
ing from  objects  of  a  crimson  or  blue  colour,  if  you  can  match 
their  colour  by  any  compartment  of  the  crimson  or  blue  in 
your  scales,  the  grey  in  the  compartment  of  the  grey  scale 
marked  with  the  same  number  is  the  grey  which  must  repre- 
sent that  crimson  or  blue  in  your  light  and  shade  drawing. 

Next,  prepare  scales  with  gamboge,  cobalt,  and  vermilion. 
You  will  find  that  you  cannot  darken  these  beyond  a  certain 
point ;  *  for  yellow  and  scarlet,  so  long  as  they  remain  yellow 
and  scarlet,  cannot  approach  to  black  ;  we  cannot  have,  prop- 
erly speaking,  a  dark  yellow  or  dark  scarlet.  Make  your 
scales  of  full  yellow,  blue,  and  scarlet,  half-way  down  ;  pass- 
ing then  gradually  to  white.  Afterwards  use  lake  to  darken 
the  upper  half  of  the  vermilion  and  gamboge ;  and  Prussian 
blue  to  darken  the  cobalt.  You  will  thus  have  three  more 
scales,  passing  from  white  nearly  to  black,  through  yellow  and 
orange,  through  sky-blue,  and  through  scarlet.  By  mixing 
the  gamboge  and  Prussian  blue  you  may  make  another  with 
green  ;  mixing  the  cobalt  and  lake,  another  with  violet ;  the 
sepia  alone  will  make  a  forcible  brown  one  ;  and  so  on,  until 
you  have  as  many  scales  as  you  like,  passing  from  black  to 
white  through  different  colours.  Then,  supposing  your  scales 
properly  gradated  and  equally  divided,  the  compartment  or 
degree  No.  1.  of  the  grey  will  represent  in  chiaroscuro  the 
No.  1.  of  all  the  other  colours ;  No.  2.  of  grey  the  No.  2.  of 
the  other  colours,  and  so  on. 

It  is  only  necessary,  however,  in  this  matter  that  you  should 
understand  the  principle  ;  for  it  would  never  be  possible  for 
you  to  gradate  your  scales  so  truly  as  to  make  them  prac- 
tically accurate  and  serviceable  ;  and  even  if  you  could,  unless 
you  had  about  ten  thousand  scales,  and  were  able  to  change 

*  The  degree  of  darkness  you  can  reach  with  the  given  colour  is  al' 
ways  indicated  by  the  colour  of  the  solid  cake  in  the  box. 


ON  FIRST  PRACTICE. 


255 


them  faster  than  ever  juggler  changed  cards,  you  could  not 
in  a  day  measure  the  tints  on  so  much  as  one  side  of  a  frost- 
bitten apple  :  but  when  once  you  fully  understand  the 
principle,  and  see  how  all  colours  contain  as  it  were  a  certain 
quantity  of  darkness,  or  power  of  dark  relief  from  white — 
some  more,  some  less  ;  and  how  this  pitch  or  power  of  each 
ma}'  be  represented  by  equivalent  values  of  grey,  you  will 
soon  be  able  to  arrive  shrewdly  at  an  approximation  by  a 
glance  of  the  eye,  without  any  measuring  scale  at  all. 

You  must  now  go  on,  again  with  the  pen,  drawing  patterns, 
and  any  shapes  of  shade  that  you  think  pretty,  as  veinings  in 
marble,  or  tortoiseshell,  spots  in  surfaces  of  shells,  &c.,  as 
tenderly  as  you  can,  in  the  darknesses  that  correspond  to 
their  colours ;  and  when  you  find  you  can  do  this  success- 
fully, it  is  time  to  begin  rounding. 

EXERCISE  VIII. 

Go  out  into  your  garden,  or  into  the  road,  and  pick  up  the 
first  round  or  oval  stone  you  can  find,  not  very  white,  nor 
very  dark  ;  and  the  smoother  it  is  the  better,  only  it  must  not 
shine.  Draw  your  table  near  the  window,  and  put  the  stone, 
which  I  will  suppose  is  about  the  size  of  a  in  Fig.  5.  (it  had 
better  not  be  much  larger),  on  a  piece  of  not  very  white 
paper,  on  the  table  in  front  of  you.  Sit  so  that  the  light  may 
come  from  your  left,  else  the  shadow  of  the  pencil  point  in- 
terferes with  your  sight  of  your  work.  You  must  not  let 
the  sun  fall  on  the  stone,  but  only  ordinary  light :  therefore 
choose  a  window  which  the  sun  does  not  come  in  at.  If  you 
can  shut  the  shutters  of  the  other  windows  in  the  room  it  will 
be  all  the  better  ;  but  this  is  not  of  much  consequence. 

Now,  if  you  can  draw  that  stone,  you  can  draw  anything  : 
I  mean,  anything  that  is  drawable.  Many  things  (sea  foam, 
for  instance)  cannot  be  drawn  at  all,  only  the  idea  of  them 
more  or  less  suggested  ;  but  if  you  can  draw  the  stone 
rightly,  every  thing  within  reach  of  art  is  also  within  yours. 

For  all  drawing  depends,  primarily,  on  your  power  of  rep- 
resenting Roundness.  If  you  can  once  do  that,  all  the  rest  is 
easy  and  straightforward  ;  if  you  cannot  do  that,  nothing 


256 


THE  ELEMENTS  OF  DRAWING. 


else  that  you  may  be  able  to  do  will  be  of  any  use.  For 
Nature  is  all  made  up  of  roundnesses  ;  not  the  roundness  of 
perfect  globes,  but  of  variously  curved  surfaces.  Boughs  are 
rounded,  leaves  are  rounded,  stones  are  rounded,  clouds  are 
rounded,  cheeks  are  rounded,  and  curls  are  rounded  :  there 
is  no  more  flatness  in  the  natural  world  than  there  is  vacancy. 
The  world  itself  is  round,  and  so  is  all  that  is  in  it,  more  or 
less,  except  human  work,  which  is  often  very  flat  indeed. 

Therefore,  set  yourself  steadily  to  conquer  that  round 
stone,  and  you  have  won  the  battle. 

Look  your  stone  antagonist  boldly  in  the  face.  You  will 
see  that  the  side  of  it  next  the  window  is  lighter  than  most  of 
the  paper :  that  the  side  of  it  farthest  from  the  window  is 
darker  than  the  paper ;  and  that  the  light  passes  into  the 
dark  gradually,  while  a  shadow  is  thrown  to  the  right  on  the 
paper  itself  by  the  stone  :  the  general  appearance  of  things 
being  more  or  less  as  in  a,  Fig.  5.,  the  spots  on  the  stone 
excepted,  of  which  more  presently. 

Now,  remember  always  what  was  stated  in  the  outset,  that 
every  thing  you  can  see  in  Nature  is  seen  only  so  far  as  it  is 
lighter  or  darker  than  the  things  about  it,  or  of  a  different 
colour  from  them.  It  is  either  seen  as  a  patch  of  one  colour 
on  a  ground  of  another  ;  or  as  a  pale  thing  relieved  from  a 
dark  thing,  or  a  dark  thing  from  a  pale  thing.  And  if  you 
can  put  on  patches  of  colour  or  shade  of  exactly  the  same 
size,  shape,  and  gradations  as  those  on  the  object  and  its 
ground,  you  will  produce  the  appearance  of  the  object  and 
its  ground.  The  best  draughtsman — Titian  and  Paul  Veronese 
themselves — could  do  no  more  than  this  ;  and  you  will  soon 
be  able  to  get  some  power  of  doing  it  in  an  inferior  way,  if 
you  once  understand  the  exceeding  simplicity  of  what  is  to  be 
done.  Suppose  you  have  a  brown  book  on  a  white  sheet  of 
paper,  on  a  red  tablecloth.  You  have  nothing  to  do  but  to 
put  on  spaces  of  red,  w7hite,  and  brown,  in  the  same  shape, 
and  gradated  from  dark  to  light  in  the  same  degrees,  and 
your  drawing  is  done.  If  you  will  not  look  at  what  you  see, 
if  you  tiy  to  put  on  brighter  or  duller  colours  than  are  there, 
if  you  try  to  put  them  on  with  a  dash  or  a  blot,  or  to  cover 


ON  FIRST  PRACTICE. 


257 


your  paper  with  "  vigorous  "  lines,  or  to  produce  anything,  in 
fact,  but  the  plain,  unaffected,  and  finished  tranquillity  of  the 
thing  before  you,  you  need  not  hope  to  get  on.  Nature  will 
show  you  nothing  if  you  set 
yourself  up  for  her  master. 
But  forget  yourself,  and  try 
to  obey  her,  and  you  will  find 
obedience  easier  and  happier 
than  you  think. 

The  real  difficulties  are  to 
get  the  refinement  of  the 
forms  and  the  evenness  of  the 
gradations.  You  may  depend 
upon  it,  when  you  are  dissat- 
isfied with  your  work,  it  is 
always  too  coarse  or  too  un- 
even. It  may  not  be  wrong 
— in  all  probability  is  not 
wrong,  in  any  (so-called) 
great  point.  But  its  edges 
are  not  true  enough  in  out- 
line ;  and  its  shades  are  in 
blotches,  or  scratches,  or  full 
of  white  holes.  Get  it  more 
tender  and  more  true,  and 
you  will  find  it  is  more  pow- 
erful. 

Do  not,  therefore,  think 
your  drawing  must  be  weak 
because  you  have  a  finely 
pointed  pen  in  your  hand. 
Till  you  can  draw  with  that, 
you  can  draw  writh  nothing  ; 
when  you  can  draw  with  that, 

you  can  draw  with  a  log  of  wood  charred  at  the  end. 
boldness  and  power  are  only  to  be  gained  by  care.  Even  in 
fencing  and  dancing,  all  ultimate  ease  depends  on  early  preci- 
sion in  the  commencement ;  much  more  in  singing  or  drawing, 


True 


258 


THE  ELEMENTS  OF  BRA  WING. 


Now,  I  do  not  want  you  to  copy  Fig.  5.,  but  to  copy  the 
stone  before  you  in  the  way  that  Fig.  5.  is  done.  To  which 
end,  first  measure  the  extreme  length  of  the  stone  with  com- 
passes, and  mark  that  length  on  your  paper  ;  then,  between 
the  points  marked,  leave  something  like  the  form  of  the  stone 
in  light,  scrawling  the  paper  all  over,  round  it,  as  at  6,  Fig.  5. 
You  cannot  rightly  see  what  the  form  of  the  stone  really  is 
till  you  begin  finishing,  so  sketch  it  in  quite  rudely ;  only 
rather  leave  too  much  room  for  the  high  light,  than  too  little  : 
and  then  more  cautiously  fill  in  the  shade,  shutting  the  light 
gradually  up,  and  putting  in  the  dark  cautiously  on  the  dark 
side.  You  need  not  plague  yourself  about  accuracy  of  shape, 
because,  till  you  have  practised  a  great  deal,  it  is  impossible 
for  you  to  draw7  that  shape  quite  truly,  and  you  must  gradu- 
ally gain  correctness  by  means  of  these  various  exercises  : 
what  you  have  mainly  to  do  at  present  is,  to  get  the  stone  to 
look  solid  and  round,  not  much  minding  what  its  exact  con- 
tour is — only  draw  it  as  nearly  right  as  you  can  without  vexa- 
tion ;  and  you  will  get  it  more  right  by  thus  feeling  your  way 
to  it  in  shade,  than  if  you  tried  to  draw  the  outline  at  first. 
For  you  can  see  no  outline  ;  what  you  see  is  only  a  certain 
space  of  gradated  shade,  with  other  such  spaces  about  it  ;  and 
those  pieces  of  shade  you  are  to  imitate  as  nearly  as  you  can, 
by  scrawling  the  paper  over  till  you  get  them  to  the  right 
shape,  with  the  same  gradations  which  they  have  in  Nature. 
And  this  is  really  more  likely  to  be  done  well,  if  you  have  to 
fight  your  way  through  a  little  confusion  in  the  sketch,  than 
if  you  have  an  accurately  traced  outline.  For  instance,  I  wras 
going  to  draw,  beside  a,  another  effect  on  the  stone  ;  reflected 
light  bringing  its  dark  side  out  from  the  background  :  but 
when  I  had  laid  on  the  first  few  touches,  I  thought  it  would 
be  better  to  stop,  and  let  you  see  how  I  had  begun  it,  at  b. 
In  which  beginning  it  will  be  observed  that  nothing  is  so  de- 
termined but  that  I  can  more  or  less  modify,  and  add  to  or 
diminish  the  contour  as  I  work  on,  the  lines  which  suggest 
the  outline  being  blended  wTith  the  others  if  I  do  not  wrant 
them  ;  and  the  having  to  fill  up  the  vacancies  and  conquer  the 
irregularities  of  such  a  sketch,  will  probably  secure  a  higher 


ON  FIRST  PRACTICE. 


259 


completion  at  last,  than  if  half  an  hour  had  been  spent  in 
getting  a  true  outline  before  beginning. 

In  doing  this,  however,  take  care  not  to  get  the  drawing  too 
dark.  In  order  to  ascertain  what  the  shades  of  it  really  are, 
cut  a  round  hole,  about  half  the  size  of  a  pea,  in  a  piece  of 
white  paper,  the  colour  of  that  you  use  to  draw  on.  Hold 
this  bit  of  paper,  with  the  hole  in  it,  between  you  and  your 
stone  ;  and  pass  the  paper  backwards  and  forwards,  so  as 
to  see  the  different  portions  of  the  stone  (or  other  subject) 
through  the  hole.  You  will  find  that,  thus,  the  circular  hole 
looks  like  one  of  the  patches  of  colour  you  have  been  accus- 
tomed to  match,  only  changing  in  depth  as  it  lets  different 
pieces  of  the  stone  be  seen  through  it.  You  will  be  able  thus 
actually  to  match  the  colour  of  the  stone,  at  any  part  of  it,  by 
tinting  the  paper  beside  the  circular  opening.  And  you  will 
find  that  this  opening  never  looks  quite  black,  but  that  all  the 
roundings  of  the  stone  are  given  by  subdued  greys.* 

You  will  probably  find,  also,  that  some  parts  of  the  stone, 
or  of  the  paper  it  lies  on,  look  luminous  through  the  open- 
ing, so  that  the  little  circle  then  tells  as  a  light  spot  instead 
of  a  dark  spot.  "When  this  is  so,  you  cannot  imitate  it,  for 
you  have  no  means  of  getting  light  brighter  than  white  paper  : 
but  by  holding  the  paper  more  sloped  towards  the  light,  you 
will  find  that  many  parts  of  the  stone,  which  before  looked 
light  through  the  hole,  then  look  dark  through  it  ;  and  if  you 
can  place  the  paper  in  such  a  position  that  every  part  of  the 
stone  looks  slightly  dark,  the  little  hole  will  tell  always  as  a 
spot  of  shade,  and  if  your  drawing  is  put  in  the  same  light, 
you  can  imitate  or  match  every  gradation.  Y'ou  will  be 
amazed  to  find,  under  these  circumstances,  how  slight  the 
differences  of  tint  are,  by  which,  through  infinite  delicacy  of 
gradation,  Nature  can  express  form. 

If  any  part  of  your  subject  will  obstinately  show  itself  as  a 
light  through  the  hole,  that  part  you  need  not  hope  to  imitate. 
Leave  it  white,  you  can  do  no  more. 

When  you  have  done  the  best  you  can  to  get  the  general 

*  The  figure  a,  Fig.  5.,  is  very  dark,  but  this  is  to  give  an  example  of 
all  kinds  of  depth  of  tint,  without  repeated  figures. 


260 


THE  ELEMENTS  OF  DRAWING. 


form,  proceed  to  finish,  by  imitating  the  texture  and  all  the 
cracks  and  stains  of  the  stone  as  closely  as  you  can  ;  and  note, 
in  doing  this,  that  cracks  or  fissures  of  any  kind,  whether  be- 
tween stones  in  walls,  or  in  the  grain  of  timber  or  rocks,  or  in 
any  of  the  thousand  other  conditions  they  present,  are  never 
expressible  by  single  black  lines,  or  lines  of  simple  shadow, 
A  crack  must  always  have  its  complete  system  of  light  and 
shade,  however  small  its  scale.  It  is  in  reality  a  little  ravine, 
with  a  dark  or  shady  side,  and  light  or  sunny  side,  and, 
usually,  shadow  in  the  bottom.  This  is  one  of  the  instances 
in  which  it  may  be  as  well  to  understand  the  reason  of  the 
appearance  ;  it  is  not  often  so  in  drawing,  for  the  aspects  of 
things  are  so  subtle  and  confused  that  they  cannot  in  general 
be  explained ;  and  in  the  endeavour  to  explain  some,  we  are 
sure  to  lose  sight  of  others,  while  the  natural  overestimate  of 
the  importance  of  those  on  which  the  attention  is  fixed,  causes 
us  to  exaggerate  them,  so  that  merely  scientific  draughtsmen 
caricature  a  third  part  of  Nature,  and  miss  two-thirds.  The 
best  scholar  is  he  whose  eye  is  so  keen  as  to  see  at  once  how 
the  thing  looks,  and  who  need  not,  therefore,  trouble  himself 
with  any  reasons  why  it  looks  so  :  but  few  people  have  this 
acuteness  of  perception  ;  and  to  those  who  are  destitute  of  it, 
a  little  pointing  out  of  rule  and  reason  will  be  a  help,  espe- 
cially when  a  master  is  not  near  them.  I  never  allow  my  own 
pupils  to  ask  the  reason  of  anything,  because,  as  I  watch  their 
work,  I  can  always  show  them  how  the  thing  is,  and  what  ap- 
pearance they  are  missing  in  it ;  but  when  a  master  is  not  by 
to  direct  the  sight,  science  may,  here  and  there,  be  allowed 
to  do  so  in  his  stead. 

Generally,  then,  every  solid  illumined  object — for  instance, 
the  stone  you  are  drawing — has  a  light  side  turned  towards 
the  light,  a  dark  side  turned  away  from  the  light,  and  a  shad- 
ow, which  is  cast  on  something  else  (as  by  the  stone  on  the 
paper  it  is  set  upon).  You  may  sometimes  be  placed  so  as  to 
see  only  the  light  side  and  shadow,  and  sometimes  only  the 
dark  side  and  shadow,  and  sometimes  both,  or  either,  without 
the  shadow  ;  but  in  most  positions  solid  objects  will  show 
all  the  three,  as  the  stone  does  here. 


ON  FIRST  PRACTICE. 


261 


Hold  up  your  hand  with  the  edge  of  it  towards  you,  as  you 
sit  now  with  your  side  to  the  window,  so  that  the  flat  of  your 
hand  is  turned  to  the  window.  You  will  see  one  side  of  your 
hand  distinctly  lighted,  the  other  distinctly  in  shade.  Here 
are  light  side  and  dark  side,  with  no  seen  shadow  ;  the  shadow 
being  detached,  perhaps  on  the  table,  perhaps  on  the  other 
side  of  the  room  ;  you  need  not  look  for  it  at  present. 

Take  a  sheet  of  note-paper,  and  holding  it  edgeways,  as  you 
hold  your  hand,  wave  it  up  and  down  past  the  side  of  your 
hand  which  is  turned  from  the  light,  the  paper  being,  of 
course,  farther  from  the  window.  You  wTill  see,  as  it  passes  a 
strong  gleam  of  light  strike  on  your  hand,  and  light  it  con- 
siderably on  its  dark  side.  This  light  is  reflected  light.  It  is 
thrown  back  from  the  paper  (on  which  it  strikes  first  in  com- 
ing from  the  window)  to  the  surface  of  your  hand,  just  as  a 
ball  would  be  if  somebody  threw  it  through  the  window  at  the 
wall  and  you  caught  it  at  the  rebound. 

Next,  instead  of  the  note-paper,  take  a  red  book,  or  a  piece 
of  scarlet  cloth.  You  will  see  that  the  gleam  of  light  falling 
on  your  hand,  as  you  wave  the  book  is  now  reddened.  Take 
a  blue  book,  and  you  will  find  the  gleam  is  blue.  Thus  every 
object  will  cast  some  of  its  own  colour  back  in  the  light  that 
it  reflects. 

Now  it  is  not  only  these  books  or  papers  that  reflect  light 
to  your  hand  :  every  object  in  the  room,  on  that  side  of  it,  re- 
flects some,  but  more  feebly,  and  the  colours  mixing  all  to- 
gether form  a  neutral  *  light,  which  lets  the  colour  of  your 
hand  itself  be  more  distinctly  seen  than  that  of  any  object 
which  reflects  light  to  it ;  but  if  there  were  no  reflected  light, 
that  side  of  your  hand  would  look  as  black  as  a  coal. 

Objects  are  seen,  therefore  in  general,  partly  by  direct  light, 
and  partly  by  light  reflected  from  the  objects  around  them, 
or  from  the  atmosphere  and  clouds.  The  colour  of  their  light 
sides  depends  much  on  that  of  the  direct  light,  and  that  of 
the  dark  sides  on  the  colours  of  the  objects  near  them.    It  is 

*  Nearly  neutral  in  ordinary  circumstances,  but  yet  with  quite  differ- 
ent tones  in  its  neutrality,  according  to  the  colours  of  the  various  re- 
flected rays  that  compose  it. 


262 


THE  ELEMENTS  OF  DRAWING. 


therefore  impossible  to  say  beforehand  what  colour  an  object 
will  have  at  any  point  of  its  surface,  that  colour  depending 
partly  on  its  own  tint,  and  partly  on  infinite  combinations  of 
rays  reflected  from  other  things.  The  only  certain  fact  about 
dark  sides  is,  that  their  colour  will  be  changeful,  and  that  a 
picture  which  gives  them  merely  darker  shades  of  the  colour 
of  the  light  sides  must  assuredly  be  bad. 

Now,  lay  your  hand  flat  on  the  white  paper  you  are  drawing 
on.  You  will  see  one  side  of  each  finger  lighted,  one  side  dark, 
and  the  shadow  of  your  hand  on  the  paper.  Here,  therefore, 
are  the  three  divisions  of  shade  seen  at  once.  And  although 
the  paper  is  wdiite,  and  your  hand  of  a  rosy  colour  somewhat 
darker  than  white,  yet  you  will  see  that  the  shadow  all  along, 
just  under  the  finger  which  casts  it,  is  darker  than  the  flesh, 
and  is  of  a  very  deep  grey.  The  reason  of  this  is,  that  much 
light  is  reflected  from  the  paper  to  the  dark  side  of  your  fin- 
ger, but  very  little  is  reflected  from  other  things  to  the  paper 
itself  in  that  chink  under  your  finger. 

In  general,  for  this  reason,  a  shadow,  or,  at  any  rate,  the 
part  of  the  shadow  nearest  the  object,  is  darker  than  the  dark 
side  of  the  object.  I  say  in  general,  because  a  thousand  ac- 
cidents may  interfere  to  prevent  its  being  so.  Take  a  little 
bit  of  glass,  as  a  wine-glass,  or  the  ink-bottle,  and  play  it  about 
a  little  on  the  side  of  your  hand  farthest  from  the  window  ; 
you  will  presently  find  you  are  throwing  gleams  of  light  all 
over  the  dark  side  of  your  hand,  and  in  some  positions  of  the 
glass  the  reflection  from  it  will  annihilate  the  shadow  al- 
together, and  you  will  see  your  hand  dark  on  the  white  paper. 
Nov/  a  stupid  painter  would  represent,  for  instance,  a  drinking- 
glass  beside  the  hand  of  one  of  his  figures,  and  because  he 
had  been  taught  by  rule  that  "  shadow  was  darker  than 
the  dark  side,"  he  would  never  think  of  the  reflection  from 
the  glass,  but  paint  a  dark  grey  under  the  hand,  just  as  if  no 
glass  were  there.  But  a  great  painter  would  be  sure  to  think 
of  the  true  effect,  and  paint  it ;  and  then  comes  the  stupid 
critic,  and  wonders  why  the  hand  is  so  light  on  its  dark  side. 

Thus  it  is  always  dangerous  to  assert  anything  as  a  rule  in 
matters  of  art ;  yet  it  is  useful  for  you  to  remember  that,  in 


ON  FIRST  PRACTICE. 


a  general  way,  a  shadow  is  darker  than  the  dark  side  of  the 
thing  that  casts  it,  supposing  the  colours  otherwise  the  same  ; 
that  is  to  say,  when  a  white  object  casts  a  shadov>r  on  a  white 
surface,  or  a  dark  object  on  a  dark  surface  :  the  rule  will  not 
hold  if  the  colours  are  different,  the  shadow  of  a  black  object 
on  a  white  surface  being,  of  course,  not  so  dark,  usually,  as 
the  black  thing  casting  it.  The  only  way  to  ascertain  the  ulti- 
mate truth  in  such  matters  is  to  look:  for  it  ;  but,  in  the  mean- 
lime,  you  will  be  helped  by  noticing  that  the  cracks  in  the 
stone  are  little  ravines,  on  one  side  of  which  the  light  strikes 
sharply,  wiiile  the  other  is  in  shade.  This  dark  side  usually 
casts  a  little  darker  shadow  at  the  bottom  of  the  crack  ;  and 
the  general  tone  of  the  stone  surface  is  not  so  bright  as  the 
light  bank  of  the  ravine.  And,  therefore,  if  you  get  the  sur- 
face of  the  object  of  a  uniform  tint,  more  or  less  indicative  of 
shade,  and  then  scratch  out  a  white  spot  or  streak  in  it  of  any 
shape  ;  by  putting  a  dark  touch  beside  this  white  one,  you 
may  turn  it,  as  you  choose,  into  either  a  ridge  or  an  incision, 
into  either  a  boss  or  a  cavity.  If  you  put  the  dark  touch  on 
the  side  of  it  nearest  the  sun,  or  rather,  nearest  the  place  that 
the  light  comes  from,  you  w7ill  make  it  a  cut  or  cavity  ;  if  you 
put  it  on  the  opposite  side,  you  will  make  it  a  ridge  or  mound  : 
and  the  complete  success  of  the  effect  depends  less  on  depth 
of  shade  than  on  the  rightness  of  the  drawing ;  that  is  to  say, 
on  the  evident  correspondence  of  the  form  of  the  shadow'  with 
the  form  that  casts  it.  In  drawing  rocks,  or  wood,  or  any- 
thing irregularly  shaped,  you  will  gain  far  more  by  a  little 
patience  in  following  the  forms  carefully,  though  with  slight 
touches,  than  by  laboured  finishing  of  textures  of  surface  and 
transparencies  of  shadow7. 

When  you  have  got  the  whole  well  into  shape,  proceed  to 
lay  on  the  stains  and  spots  with  great  care,  quite  as  much  as 
you  gave  to  the  forms.  Very  often,  spots  or  bars  of  local 
colour  do  more  to  express  form  than  even  the  light  and  shade, 
and  they  are  always  interesting  as  the  means  by  which  Nature 
carries  light  into  her  shadows,  and  shade  into  her  lights,  an 
art  of  which  we  shall  have  more  to  say  hereafter,  in  speaking 
of  composition.  Fig.  5.  is  a  rough  sketch  of  a  fossil  sea-urchin, 


2G4 


TEE  ELEMENTS  OF  DRAWING. 


in  which  the  projections  of  the  shell  are  of  black  flint,  coming 
through  a  chalky  surface.  These  projections  form  dark  spots 
in  the  light  ;  and  their  sides,  rising  out  of  the  shadow,  form 
smaller  whitish  spots  in  the  dark.  You  may  take  such  scat- 
tered lights  as  these  out  with  the  penknife,  provided  you  are 
just  as  careful  to  place  them  rightly,  as  if  you  got  them  by  a 
more  laborious  process. 

"When  you  have  once  got  the  feeling  of  the  way  in  wrhich 
gradation  expresses  roundness  and  projection,  you  may  try 
your  strength  on  anything  natural  or  artificial  that  happens 
to  take  your  fancy,  provided  it  be  not  too  complicated  in 
form.  I  have  asked  you  to  draw  a  stone  first,  because  any 
irregularities  and  failures  in  your  shading  will  be  less  offensive 
to  you,  as  being  partly  characteristic  of  the  rough  stone  sur- 
face, than  they  would  be  in  a  more  delicate  subject ;  and  you 
may  as  well  go  on  drawing  rounded  stones  of  different  shapes 
for  a  little  while,  till  you  find  you  can  really  shade  delicately. 
You  may  then  take  up  folds  of  thick  white  drapery,  a  napkin 
or  towel  thrown  carelessly  on  the  table  is  as  good  as  anything, 
and  try  to  express  them  in  the  same  way  ;  only  now  you  will 
find  that  your  shades  must  be  wrought  with  perfect  unity  and 
tenderness,  or  you  will  lose  the  flow  of  the  folds.  Always  re- 
member that  a  little  bit  perfected  is  worth  more  than  many 
scrawls  ;  whenever  you  feel  yourself  inclined  to  scrawl,  give 
up  work  resolutely,  and  do  not  go  back  to  it  till  next  day. 
Of  course  your  towel  or  napkin  must  be  put  on  something 
that  may  be  locked  up,  so  that  its  folds  shall  not  be  disturbed 
till  you  have  finished.  If  you  find  that  the  folds  will  not  look 
right,  get  a  photograph  of  a  piece  of  drapery  (there  are  plenty 
now  to  be  bought,  taken  from  the  sculpture  of  the  cathedrals 
of  Eheims,  Amiens,  and  Chartres,  which  will  at  once  educate 
your  hand  and  your  taste),  and  copy  some  piece  of  that ;  you 
will  then  ascertain  what  it  is  that  is  wanting  in  your  studies 
from  nature,  whether  more  gradation,  or  greater  watchfulness 
of  the  disposition  of  the  folds.  Probably  for  some  time  you  will 
find  yourself  failing  painfully  in  both,  for  drapery  is  very  diffi- 
cult to  follow  in  its  sweeps  ;  but  do  not  lose  courage,  for  the 
greater  the  difficulty,  the  greater  the  gain  in  the  effort.  If 


OJS  FIRST  PHAGTICM 


265 


your  eye  is  more  just  in  measurement  of  form  than  delicate  in 
perception  of  tint,  a  pattern  on  the  folded  surface  will  help 
you.  Try  whether  it  does  or  not ;  and  if  the  patterned 
drapery  confuses  you,  keep  for  a  time  to  the  simple  white 
one  ;  but  if  it  helps  you,  continue  to  choose  patterned  stuffs 
(tartans,  and  simple  chequered  designs  are  better  at  first  than 
flowered  ones),  and  even  though  it  should  confuse  you,  begin 
pretty  soon  to  use  a  pattern  occasionally,  copying  all  the  dis- 
tortions and  perspective  modifications  of  it  among  the  folds 
with  scrupulous  care. 

Neither  must  you  suppose  yourself  condescending  in  doing 
this.  The  greatest  masters  are  always  fond  of  drawing  pat- 
terns ;  and  the  greater  they  are,  the  more  pains  they  take  to 
do  it  truly. *  Nor  can  there  be  better  practice  at  any  time,  as 
introductory  to  the  nobler  complication  of  natural  detail. 
For  when  you  can  draw  the  spots  which  follow  the  folds  of  a 
printed  stuff,  you  will  have  some  chance  of  following  the  spots 
which  fall  into  the  folds  of  the  skin  of  a  leopard  as  he  leaps ; 
but  if  you  cannot  draw  the  manufacture,  assuredly  you  will 
never  be  able  to  draw  the  creature.  So  the  cloudings  on  a 
piece  of  wood,  carefully  drawn,  will  be  the  best  introduction 
to  the  drawing  of  the  clouds  of  the  sky,  or  the  waves  of  the 
sea  ;  and  the  dead  leaf-patterns  on  a  damask  drapery,  well 
rendered,  will  enable  you  to  disentangle  masterfully  the  living 
leaf-patterns  of  a  thorn  thicket,  or  a  violet  bank. 

Observe,  however,  in  drawing  any  stuffs,  or  bindings  of 
books,  or  other  finely  textured  substances,  do  not  trouble 
yourself,  as  yet,  much  about  the  woolliness  or  gauziness  of  the 
thing  ;  but  get  it  right  in  shade  and  fold,  and  true  in  pattern. 
We  shall  see,  in  the  course  of  after-practice,  how  the  penned 

*  If  we  had  any  business  with  the  reasons  of  this,  I  might,  perhaps, 
he  able  to  show  you  some  metaphysical  ones  for  the  enjoyment,  by 
truly  artistical  minds,  of  the  changes  wrought  by  light,  and  shade,  and 
perspective  in  patterned  surfaces  ;  but  this  is  at  present  not  to  the 
point  ;  and  all  that  you  need  to  know  is  that  the  drawing  of  such  things 
is  good  exercise,  and  moreover  a  kind  of  exercise  which  Titian,  Vero- 
nese, Tintoret,  Giorgione,  and  Turner,  all  enjoyed,  and  strove  to  excel 
in. 


266 


THE  ELEMENTS  OP  BRA  WING. 


lines  may  be  made  indicative  of  texture  ;  bufc  at  present  at 
tend  only  to  the  light,  and  shade,  and  pattern.  You  will  be 
puzzled  at  first  by  lustrous  surfaces,  but  a  little  attention  will 
show  you  that  the  expression  of  these  depends  merely  on  the 
right  drawing  of  their  light,  and  shade,  and  reflections.  Put 
a  small  black  japanned  tray  on  the  table  in  front  of  some 
books  ;  and  you  will  see  it  reflects  the  objects  beyond  it  as  in 
a  little  black  rippled  pond  ;  its  own  colour  mingling  always 
with  that  of  the  reflected  objects.  Draw  these  reflections  oi 
the  books  properly,  making  them  dark  and  distorted,  as  you 
will  see  that  they  are,  and  you  will  find  that  this  gives  the 
lustre  to  your  tray.  It  is  not  well,  however,  to  draw  polished 
objects  in  general  practice  ;  only  you  should  do  one  or  two  in 
order  to  understand  the  aspect  of  any  lustrous  portion  of 
other  things,  such  as  you  cannot  avoid  ;  the  gold,  for  instance, 
on  the  edges  of  books,  or  the  shining  of  silk  and  damask,  in 
which  lies  a  great  part  of  the  expression  of  their  folds.  Ob- 
serve, also,  that  there  are  very  few  things  which  are  totally 
without  lustre  :  you  wTill  frequently  find  a  light  which  puzzles 
you,  on  some  apparently  dull  surface,  to  be  the  dim  image  of 
another  object. 

And  now,  as  soon  as  you  can  conscientiously  assure  me  that 
with  the  point  of  the  pen  or  pencil  you  can  lay  on  any  form 
and  shade  you  like,  I  give  you  leave  to  use  the  brush  with  one 
colour, — sepia,  or  blue-black,  or  mixed  cobalt  and  blue-black, 
or  neutral  tint  ;  and  this  will  much  facilitate  your  study,  and 
refresh  you.  But,  preliminarily,  you  must  do  one  or  two  more 
exercises  in  tinting. 

EXERCISE  IX. 

Prepare  your  colour  as  before  directed.  Take  a  brush  full 
of  it,  and  strike  it  on  the  paper  in  any  irregular  shape  ;  as  the 
brush  gets  dry  sweep  the  surface  of  the  paper  with  it  as  if  you 
were  dusting  the  paper  very  lightly  ;  every  such  sweep  of  the 
brush  will  leave  a  number  of  more  or  less  minute  interstices 
in  the  colour.  The  lighter  and  faster  every  dash  the  better. 
Then  leave  the  whole  to  dry,  and  as  soon  as  it  is  dry,  with  lit- 


ON  FIRST  PRACTICE. 


267 


tie  colour  in  your  brush,  so  that  you  can  bring  it  to  a  fine 
point,  fill  up  all  the  little  interstices  one  by  one,  so  as  to  make 
the  whole  as  even  as  you  can,  and  fill  in  the  larger  gaps  with 
more  colour,  always  trying  to  let  the  edges  of  the  first  and  of 
the  newly  applied  colour  exactly  meet,  and  not  lap  over  each 
Dther.  When  your  new  colour  dries,  you  will  find  it  in  places 
a  little  paler  than  the  first.  Retouch  it,  therefore,  trying  to 
get  the  whole  to  look  quite  one  piece.  A  very  small  bit  of 
colour  thus  filled  up  with  your  very  best  care,  and  brought  to 
look  as  if  it  had  been  quite  even  from  the  first,  will  give  you 
better  practice  and  more  skill  than  a  great  deal  filled  in  care- 
lessly ;  so  do  it  with  your  best  patience,  not  leaving  the  most 
minute  spot  of  white  ;  and  do  not  fill  in  the  large  pieces  first 
and  then  go  to  the  small,  but  quietly  and  steadily  cover  in  the 
whole  up  to  a  marked  limit ;  then  advance  a  little  farther,  and 
so  on  ;  thus  always  seeing  distinctly  what  is  done  and  what 
undone. 

exercise  x. 

Lay  a  coat  of  the  blue,  prepared  as  usual,  over  a  whole 
square  of  paper.  Let  it  dry.  Then  another  coat  over  four- 
fifths  of  the  square,  or  thereabouts,  leaving  the  edge  rather  ir- 
regular than  straight,  and  let  it  dry.  Then  another  coat  over 
three-fifths  ;  another  over  two-fifths  ;  and  the  last  over  one- 
fifth  ;  so  that  the  square  may  present  the  appearance  of  grad- 
ual increase  in  darkness  in  five  bands,  each  darker  than  the 
one  beyond  it.  Then,  with  the  brush  rather  dry  (as  in  the 
former  exercise,  when  filling  up  the  interstices),  try,  with 
small  touches,  like  those  used  in  the  pen  etching,  only  a  little 
broader,  to  add  shade  delicately  beyond  each  edge,  so  as  to 
lead  the  darker  tints  into  the  paler  ones  imperceptibly.  By 
touching  the  paper  very  lightly,  and  putting  a  multitude  of 
little  touches,  crossing  and  recrossing  in  every  direction,  you 
will  gradually  be  able  to  work  up  to  the  darker  tints,  outside  of 
each,  so  as  quite  to  efface  their  edges,  and  unite  them  ten- 
derly with  the  next  tint.  The  whole  square,  when  done, 
should  look  evenly  shaded  from  dark  to  pale,  with  no  bars ; 


268 


THE  ELEMENTS  OF  DRAWING. 


only  a  crossing  texture  of  touches,  something  like  chopped 
straw,  over  the  whole. * 

Next,  take  your  rounded  pebble  ;  arrange  it  in  any  light 
and  shade  you  like  ;  outline  it  very  loosely  with  the  pencil. 
Put  on  a  wash  of  colour,  prepared  very  pale,  quite  flat  over 
all  of  it,  except  the  highest  light,  leaving  the  edge  of  your 
colour  quite  sharp.  Then  another  wash,  extending  only  over 
the  darker  parts,  leaving  the  edge  of  that  sharp  also,  as  in 
tinting  the  square.  Then  another  wash  over  the  still  darker 
parts,  and  another  over  the  darkest,  leaving  each  edge  to  dry 
sharp.  Then,  with  the  small  touches,  efface  the  edges,  rein- 
force the  darks,  and  work  the  whole  delicately  together,  as  you 
would  with  the  pen,  till  you  have  got  it  to  the  likeness  of  the 
true  light  and  shade.  You  will  find  that  the  tint  underneath 
is  a  great  help,  and  that  you  can  now  get  effects  much  more 
subtle  and  complete  than  with  the  pen  merely. 

The  use  of  leaving  the  edges  always  sharp  is  that  you  may 
not  trouble  or  vex  the  colour,  but  let  it  lie  as  it  falls  suddenly 
on  the  paper  ;  colour  looks  much  more  lovely  when  it  has  been 
laid  on  with  a  dash  of  the  brush,  and  left  to  dry  in  its  own 
way,  than  when  it  has  been  dragged  about  and  disturbed  ;  so 
that  it  is  always  better  to  let  the  edges  and  forms  be  a  little 
wrong,  even  if  one  cannot  correct  them  afterwards,  than  to 
lose  this  fresh  quality  of  the  tint.  Very  great  masters  in  water- 
colour  can  lay  on  the  true  forms  at  once  with  a  dash,  and  bad 
masters  in  water-colour  lay  on  grossly  false  forms  with  a  dash, 
and  leave  them  false  ;  for  people  in  general,  not  knowing  false 
from  true,  are  as  much  pleased  with  the  appearance  of  power 
in  the  irregular  blot  as  with  the  presence  of  power  in  the  de- 
termined one  ;  but  ive,  in  our  beginnings,  must  do  as  much  as 
we  can  with  the  broad  dash,  and  then  correct  with  the  point, 
till  we  are  quite  right.  We  must  take  care  to  be  right,  at 
whatever  cost  of  pains  ;  and  then  gradually  we  shall  find  we 
can  be  right  with  freedom. 

I  have  hitherto  limited  you  to  colour  mixed  with  two  01 

*  The  use  of  acquiring  this  habit  of  execution  is  that  you  may  be  able^ 
when  you  begin  to  colour,  to  let  one  hue  be  seen  in  minute  portions, 
gleaming  between  the  touches  of  another. 


ON  FIRST  PRACTICE. 


269 


three  teaspoonfuls  of  water ;  but  in  finishing  your  light  and 
shade  from  the  stone,  you  may.  as  you  efface  the  edge  of  the 
palest  coat  towards  the  light,  use  the  colour  for  the  small 
touches  with  more  and  more  water,  till  it  is  so  pale  as  not  to 
be  perceptible.  Thus  you  may  obtain  a  perfect  gradation  to 
the  light.  And  in  reinforcing  the  darks,  when  they  are  very 
dark,  you  may  use  less  and  less  water.  If  you  take  the  colour 
tolerably  dark  on  your  brush,  only  always  liquid  (not  pasty), 
and  dash  away  the  superfluous  colour  on  blotting-paper,  you 
will  find  that,  touching  the  paper  very  lightly  with  the  dry 
brush,  you  can,  by  repeated  touches,  produce  a  dusty  kind  of 
bloom,  very  valuable  in  giving  depth  to  shadow  ;  but  it  re- 
quires great  patience  and  delicacy  of  hand  to  do  this  properly. 
You  will  find  much  of  this  kind  of  work  in  the  grounds  and 
shadows  of  William  Hunt's  drawings.* 

As  you  get  used  to  the  brush  and  colour,  you  will  gradually 
find  out  their  ways  for  yourself,  and  get  the  management  of 
them.  Nothing  but  practice  will  do  this  perfectly ;  but  you 
will  often  save  yourself  much  discouragement  by  remembering 
what  I  have  so  often  asserted, — that  if  anything  goes  wrong, 
it  is  nearly  sure  to  be  refinement  that  is  wanting,  not  force  ; 
and  connexion,  not  alteration.  If  you  dislike  the  state  your 
drawing  is  in,  do  not  lose  patience  with  it,  nor  dash  at  it,  nor 
alter  its  plan,  nor  rub  it  desperately  out,  at  the  place  you 
think  wrong  ;  but  look  if  there  are  no  shadows  you  can  gra- 
date more  perfectly  ;  no  little  gaps  and  rents  you  can  fill ;  no 
forms  you  can  more  delicately  define  :  and  do  not  rush  at  any 
of  the  errors  or  incompletions  thus  discerned,  but  efface  or 
supply  slowly,  and  you  will  soon  find  your  drawing  take 
another  look.  A  very  useful  expedient  in  producing  some 
effects,  is  to  wet  the  paper,  and  then  lay  the  colour  on  it,  more 
or  less  wet,  according  to  the  effect  you  want.  You  will  soon 
see  how  prettily  it  gradates  itself  as  it  dries  ;  when  dry,  you 
can  reinforce  it  with  delicate  stippling  when  you  want  it 
darker.  Also,  while  the  colour  is  still  damp  on  the  paper,  by 
drying  your  brush  thoroughly,  and  touching  the  colour  with 
the  brush  so  dried,  you  may  take  out  soft  lights  with  great 
*  William  Hunt,  of  the  Old  Water-colour  Society. 


270 


THE  ELEMENTS  OF  DRAWING. 


tenderness  and  precision.  Try  all  sorts  of  experiments  of  thia 
kind,  noticing  how  the  colour  behaves  ;  but  remembering  al- 
ways that  your  final  results  must  be  obtained,  and  can  only 
be  obtained,  by  pure  work  with  the  point,  as  much  as  in  the 
pen  drawing. 

You  will  find  also,  as  you  deal  with  more  and  more  compli- 
cated subjects,  that  Nature's  resources  in  light  and  shade  are 
so  much  richer  than  yours,  that  you  cannot  possibly  get  all,  or 
anything  like  all,  the  gradations  of  shadow  in  any  given  group. 
When  this  is  the  case,  determine  first  to  keep  the  broad  masses 
of  things  distinct :  if,  for  instance,  there  is  a  green  book,  and 
a  white  piece  of  paper,  and  a  black  inkstand  in  the  group,  be 
sure  to  keep  the  white  paper  as  a  light  mass,  the  green  book 
as  a  middle  tint  mass,  the  black  inkstand  as  a  dark  mass ;  and 
do  not  shade  the  folds  in  the  paper,  or  corners  of  the  book,  so 
as  to  equal  in  depth  the  darkness  of  the  inkstand.  The  great 
difference  between  the  masters  of  light  and  shade,  and  imper- 
fect artists,  is  the  power  of  the  former  to  draw  so  delicately 
as  to  express  form  in  a  dark-coloured  object  with  little  light, 
and  in  a  light-coloured  object  with  little  darkness  ;  and  it  is 
better  even  to  leave  the  forms  here  and  there  unsatisfactorily 
rendered  than  to  lose  the  general  relations  of  the  great  masses. 
And  this  observe,  not  because  masses  are  grand  or  desirable 
things  in  your  composition  (for  with  composition  at  present 
you  have  nothing  whatever  to  do),  but  because  it  is  a  fact  that 
things  do  so  present  themselves  to  the  eyes  of  men.  and  that 
we  see  paper,  book,  and  inkstand  as  three  separate  things,  be- 
fore we  see  the  wrinkles,  or  chinks,  or  corners  of  any  of  the 
three.  Understand,  therefore,  at  once,  that  no  detail  can  be 
as  strongly  expressed  in  drawing  as  it  is  in  the  reality  ;  and 
strive  to  keep  all  your  shadows  and  marks  and  minor  mark- 
ings on  the  masses,  lighter  than  they  appear  to  be  in  Nature  , 
you  are  sure  otherwise  to  get  them  too  dark.  You  will  in 
doing  this  find  that  you  cannot  get  the  projection  of  things 
sufficiently  shown  ;  but  never  mind  that  ;  there  is  no  need 
that  they  should  appear  to  project,  but  great  need  that 
their  relations  of  shade  to  each  other  should  be  preserved 
All  deceptive  projection  is  obtained  by  partial  exaggeration  oi 


ON  FIRST  PRACTICE. 


271 


shadow ;  and  whenever  you  see  it,  you  may  be  sure  the  draw- 
ing is  more  or  less  bad  ;  a  thoroughly  fine  drawing  or  paint- 
ing will  always  show  a  slight  tendency  towards  flatness. 

Observe,  on  the  other  hand,  that  however  white  an  object 
may  be,  there  is  always  some  small  point  of  it  whiter  than  the 
rest.  You  must  therefore  have  a  slight  tone  of  grey  over 
everything  in  your  picture  except  on  the  extreme  high  lights  ; 
even  the  piece  of  white  paper,  in  your  subject,  must  be  toned 
slightly  down,  unless  (and  there  are  a  thousand  chances  to 
one  against  its  being  so)  it  should  all  be  turned  so  as  fully  to 
front  the  light.  By  examining  the  treatment  of  the  white  ob- 
jects in  any  pictures  accessible  to  you  by  Paul  Veronese  or 
Titian,  you  will  soon  understand  this.* 

As  soon  as  you  feel  yourself  capable  of  expressing  with  the 
brush  the  undulations  of  surfaces  and  the  relations  of  masses, 
you  may  proceed  to  draw  more  complicated  and  beautiful 
things.f  And  first,  the  boughs  of  trees,  now  not  in  mere  dark 
relief,  but  in  full  rounding.  Take  the  first  bit  of  branch  or 
stump  that  comes  to  hand,  with  a  fork  in  it ;  cut  off  the  ends 
of  the  forking  branches,  so  as  to  leave  the  whole  only  about 
a  foot  in  length  ;  get  a  piece  of  paper  the  same  size,  fix  your 
bit  of  branch  in  some  place  where  its  position  will  not  be 
altered,  and  draw  it  thoroughly,  in  all  its  light  and  shade,  full 
size  ;  striving,  above  all  things,  to  get  an  accurate  expression 
of  its  structure  at  the  fork  of  the  branch.    "When  once  you 

*  At  Marlborough  House,  among  the  four  principal  examples  of  Tur- 
ner's later  water-colour  drawing,  perhaps  the  most  neglected  is  that  of 
lishing-boats  and  fish  at  sunset.  It  is  one  of  his  most  wonderful  works, 
though  unfinished.  If  you  examine  the  larger  white  fishing-boat  sail, 
you  will  find  it  has  a  little  spark  of  pure  white  in  its  right-hand  upper 
corner,  about  as  large  as  a  minute  pin's  head,  and  that  all  the  surf  ace  of 
the  sail  is  gradated  to  that  focus.  Try  to  copy  this  sail  once  or  twice, 
and  you  will  begin  to  understand  Turner's  work.  Similarly,  the  wing 
of  the  Cupid  in  Correggio's  large  picture  in  the  National  Gallery  is  fo- 
cussed  to  two  little  grains  of  white  at  the  top  of  it.  The  points  of  light 
on  the  white  flower  in  the  wreath  round  the  head  of  the  dancing  child- 
faun,  in  Titian's  Bacchus  and  Ariadne,  exemplify  the  same  thing. 

r  I  shall  not  henceforward  number  the  exercises  recommended  ;  as 
they  are  distinguished  only  by  increasing  difficulty  of  subject,  not  by 
cl-ifierence  of  method. 


272 


THE  ELEMENTS  OF  DRAWING. 


have  mastered  the  tree  at  its  ai^mpits,  you  will  have  little  more 
trouble  with  it. 

Always  draw  whatever  the  background  happens  to  be,  ex- 
actly as  you  see  it.  "Wherever  you  have  fastened  the  bough, 
you  must  draw  whatever  is  behind  it,  ugly  or  not,  else  you  will 
never  know  whether  the  light  and  shade  are  right ;  they  may 
appear  quite  wrong  to  you,  only  for  wrant  of  the  background. 

And  this  general  law  is  to  be  ob- 
served in  all  your  studies :  what- 
ever you  draw,  draw  completely 
and  unalteringly,  else  you  never 
know  if  what  you  have  done  is 
right,  or  whether  you  could  have 
done  it  rightly  had  you  tried. 
There  is  nothing  visible  out  of 
which  you  may  not  get  useful 
practice. 

Next,  to  put  the  leaves  on  your 
boughs.  Gather  a  small  twig  with 
four  or  five  leaves  on  it,  put  it  into 
water,  put  a  sheet  of  light-col- 
oured or  white  paper  behind  it, 
so  that  all  the  leaves  may  be  re- 
lieved in  dark  from  the  white 
field  ;  then  sketch  in  their  dark 
shape  carefully  with  pencil  as  you 
did  the  complicated  boughs,  in 
order  to  be  sure  that  all  their 
masses  and  interstices  are  right  in 
shape  before  you  begin  shading, 
and  complete  as  far  as  you  can 
with  pen  and  ink,  in  the  manner  of  Fig.  6.,  which  is  a  young 
shoot  of  lilac. 

You  will  probably,  in  spite  of  all  your  pattern  drawings,  be 
at  first  puzzled  by  leaf  foreshortening  ;  especially  because  the 
look  of  retirement  or  projection  depends  not  so  much  on  the 
perspective  of  the  leaves  themselves  as  on  the  double  sight  of 
the  two  eyes.    Now  there  are  certain  artifices  by  which  good 


ON  FIRST  PRACTICE, 


273 


painters  can  partly  conquer  this  difficulty  ;  as  slight  exaggera- 
tions of  force  or  colour  in  the  nearer  parts,  and  of  obscurity 
in  the  more  distant  ones  ;  but  you  mast  not  attempt  anything 
of  this  kind.  When  you  are  first  sketching  the  leaves,  shut 
one  of  your  eyes,  fix  a  point  in  the  background,  to  bring  the 
point  of  one  of  the  leaves  against,  and  so  sketch  the  whole 
bough  as  you  see  it  in  a  fixed  position,  looking  with  one  eye 
only.  Your  drawing  never  can  be  made  to  look  like  the  ob- 
ject itself,  as  you  see  that  object  with  both  eyes,*  but  it  can  be 
made  perfectly  like  the  object  seen  with  one,  and  you  must  be 
content  when  you  have  got  a  resemblance  on  these  terms. 

In  order  to  get  clearly  at  the  notion  of  the  thing  to  be  done, 
take  a  single  long  leaf,  hold  it  with  its  point  towards  you,  and 
as  flat  as  you  can,  so  as  to  see  nothing  of  it  but  its  thinness, 
as  if  you  wanted  to  know  how  thin  it  was  ;  outline  it  so. 
Then  slope  it  down  gradually  towards  you,  and  watch  it  as  it 
lengthens  out  to  its  full  length,  held  perpendicularly  down 
before  you.  Draw  it  in  three  or  four  different  positions  be- 
tween these  extremes,  with  its  ribs  as  they  appear  in  each 
position,  and  you  will  soon  fiijd  out  how  it  must  be. 

Draw  first  only  two  or  three  of  the  leaves  ;  then  larger  clus- 
ters ;  and  practise,  in  this  way,  more  and  more  complicated 
pieces  of  bough  and  leafage,  till  you  find  you  can  master  the 
most  difficult  arrangements,  not  consisting  of  more  than  ten 
or  twelve  leaves.  You  will  find  as  you  do  this,  if  you  have  an 
opportunity  of  visiting  any  gallery  of  pictures,  that  you  take  a 
much  more  lively  interest  than  before  in  the  work  of  the  great 
masters  ;  you  will  see  that  very  often  their  best  backgrounds 
are  composed  of  little  more  than  a  few  sprays  of  leafage,  care- 
fully studied,  brought  against  the  distant  sky  ;  and  that  an- 
other wreath  or  two  form  the  chief  interest  of  their  fore- 
grounds. If  you  live  in  London  you  may  test  your  progress 
accurately  by  the  degree  of  admiration  you  feel  for  the  leaves 
of  vine  round  the  head  of  the  Bacchus,  in  Titian's  Bacchus 

*  If  you  understand  the  principle  of  the  stereoscope  you  will  know 
why  ;  if  not,  it  does  not  matter  ;  trust  me  for  the  truth  of  the  state- 
ment, as  I  cannot  explain  the  principle  without  diagrams  and  much  loss 
«>£  time. 


274 


THE  ELEMENTS  OF  DRA  WING. 


and  Ariadne.  All  this,  however,  will  not  enable  you  to  dra\t 
a  mass  of  foliage.  You  will  find,  on  looking  at  any  rich  piece 
of  vegetation,  that  it  is  only  one  or  two  of  the  nearer  clusters 
that  you  can  by  any  possibility  draw  in  this  complete  manner. 
The  mass  is  too  vast,  and  too  intricate,  to  be  thus  dealt  with. 

You  must  now  therefore  have  recourse  to  some  confused 
mode  of  execution,  capable  of  expressing  the  confusion  of 
Nature.  And,  first,  you  must  understand  what  the  character 
of  that  confusion  is.  If  you  look  carefully  at  the  outer  sprays 
of  any  tree  at  twenty  or  thirty  yards'  distance,  you  will  see 
them  defined  against  the  sky  in  masses,  which,  at  first,  look 
quite  definite  ;  but  if  you  examine  them,  you  will  see,  mingled 
with  the  real  shapes  of  leaves,  many  indistinct  lines,  which  are, 


some  of  them,  stalks  of  leaves,  and  some,  leaves  seen  with  the 
edge  turned  towards  you,  and  coming  into  sight  in  a  broken 
way  ;  for,  supposing  the  real  leaf  shape  to  be  as  at  a,  Fig.  7., 
this,  when  removed  some  yards  from  the  eye,  will  appear  dark 
against  the  sky,  as  at  b;  then,  wThen  removed  some  yards 
farther  still,  the  stalk  and  point  disappear  altogether,  the  mid- 
dle of  the  leaf  becomes  little  more  than  a  line  ;  and  the  result 
is  the  condition  at  c,  only  with  this  farther  subtlety  in  the  look 
of  it,  inexpressible  in  fche  woodcut,  that  the  stalk  and  point  of 
the  leaf,  though  they  have  disappeared  to  the  eye,  have  yet 
some  influence  in  checking  the  light  at  the  places  where  they 
exist,  and  cause  a  slight  dimness  about  the  part  of  the  leaf 
which  remains  visible,  so  that  its  perfect  effect  could  only  be 
rendered  by  two  layers  of  colour^  one  subduing  the  sky  tone 


a 


C 


Fig.  7. 


ON  FIRST  PRACTICE. 


275 


a  little,  the  next  drawing  the  broken  portions  of  the  le#f,  as  xt 
c,  and  carefully  indicating  the  greater  darkness  of  the  spot  in 
the  middle,  where  the  under  side  of  the  leaf  is. 

This  is  the  perfect  theory  of  the  matter.  In  practice  we 
cannot  reach  such  accuracy  ;  but  we  shall  be  able  to  render 
the  general  look  of  the  foliage  satisfactorily  by  the  following 
mode  of  practice. 

Gather  a  spray  of  any  tree,  about  a  foot  or  eighteen  inches 
long.  Fix  it  firmly  by  the  stem  in  anything  that  will  support 
it  steadily  ;  put  it  about  eight  feet  away  from  you,  or  ven  ft 


Fig.  8. 


you  are  far-sighted.  Put  a  sheet  of  not  very  white  paper 
behind  it,  as  usual.  Then  draw  very  carefully,  first  placing 
them  with  pencil,  and  then  filling  them  up  with  ink,  every 
leaf,  mass  and  stalk  of  it  in  simple  black  profile,  as  you  see 
them  against  the  paper:  Fig.  8.  is  a  bough  of  Phillyrea  so 
drawn.  Do  not  be  afraid  of  running  the  leaves  into  a  black 
mass  when  they  come  together  ;  this  exercise  is  only  to  teach 
you  what  the  actual  shapes  of  such  masses  are  when  seen 
against  the  sky. 

Make  two  careful  studies  of  this  kind  of  one  bough  of  every 
common  tree — oak,  ash,  elm,  birch,  beech,  &c.  ;  in  fact,  if  you 


27G 


THE  ELEMENTS  OF  DBA  WING. 


are  goo<J,  and  industrious,  you  will  make  one  such  study  care* 
fully  at  least  three  times  a  week,  until  you  have  examples  of 
every  sort  of  tree  and  shrub  you  can  get  branches  of.  You 
are  to  make  two  studies  of  each  bough,  for  this  reason — all 
masses  of  foliage  have  an  upper  and  under  surface,  and  the 
side  view  of  them,  or  profile,  shows  a  wholly  different  organisa- 
tion of  branches  from  that  seen  in  the  view  from  above.  They 
are  generally  seen  more  or  less  in  profile,  as  you  look  at  the 
whole  tree,  and  Nature  puts  her  best  composition  into  the 
profile  arrangement.  But  the  view  from  above  or  below  oc- 
curs not  unfrequently,  also,  and  it  is  quite  necessary  you 
should  draw  it  if  you  wish  to  understand  the  anatomy  of  the 
tree.    The  difference  between  the  two  views  is  oiten  far  greater 


than  you  could  easily  conceive.  For  instance,  in  Fig.  9.,  a  is 
the  upper  view,  and  b  the  j)rofile,  of  a  single  spray  of  Philly- 
rea.  Fig.  8.  is  an  intermediate  view  of  a  larger  bough  ;  seen 
from  beneath,  but  at  some  lateral  distance  also. 

When  you  have  done  a  few  branches  in  this  manner,  take 
one  of  the  drawings,  and  put  it  first  a  yard  away  from  you, 
then  a  yard  and  a  half,  then  two  yards ;  observe  how  the  thin- 
ner stalks  and  leaves  gradually  disappear,  leaving  only  a  vague 
and  slight  darkness  where  they  were,  and  make  another  study 
of  the  effect  at  each  distance,  taking  care  to  draw  nothing 
more  than  you  really  see,  for  in  this  consists  all  the  difference 
between  what  would  be  merely  a  miniature  drawing  of  the 
leaves  seen  near,  and  &  full-size  drawing  of  the  same  leaves  at 
a  distance.  By  full  size,  I  mean  the  size  which  they  would 
really  appear  of  if  their  outline  were  traced  through  a  pane  of 


Fig.  9. 


ON  FIRST  PRACTICE. 


277 


glass  held  at  the  same  distance  from  the  eye  at  which  you 
mean  to  hold  your  drawing.  You  can  always  ascertain  this 
full  size  of  any  object  by  holding  your  paper  upright  before 
you,  at  the  distance  from  your  eye  at  which  you  wish  your 
drawing  to  be  seen.  Bring  its  edge  across  the  object  you 
have  to  draw,  and  mark  upon  this  edge  the  points  where  the 
outline  of  the  object  crosses,  or  goes  behind,  the  edge  of  the 
paper.  You  will  always  find  it,  thus  measured,  smaller  than 
you  supposed. 

When  you  have  made  a  few  careful  experiments  of  this 
kind  on  your  own  drawings,  (which  are  better  for  practice,  at 
first,  than  the  real  trees,  because  the  black  profile  in  the  draw- 
ing is  quite  stable,  and  does  not  shake,  and  is  not  confused  by 
sparkles  of  lustre  on  the  leaves,)  you  may  try  the  extremities 
of  the  real  trees,  only  not  doing  mucli  at  a  time,  for  the 
brightness  of  the  sky  will  dazzle  and  perplex  your  sight.  And 
this  brightness  causes,  I  believe,  some  loss  of  the  outline 
itself  ;  at  least  the  chemical  action  of  the  light  in  a  photograph 
extends  much  within  the  edges  of  the  leaves,  and,  as  it  were, 
eats  them  away  so  that  no  tree  extremity,  stand  it  ever  so 
still,  nor  any  other  form  coming  against  bright  sky,  is  truly 
drawn  by  a  photograph  ;  and  if  you  once  succeed  in  drawing  a 
few  sprays  rightly,  you  will  find  the  result  much  more  lovely 
and  interesting  than  any  photograph  can  be. 

All  this  difficult}',  however,  attaches  to  the  rendering  merely 
the  dark  form  of  the  sprays  as  they  come  against  the  sky. 
Within  those  sprays,  and  in  the  heart  of  the  tree,  there  is  a 
complexity  of  a  much  more  embarrassing  kind  ;  for  nearly  all 
leaves  have  some  lustre,  and  all  are  more  or  less  translucent 
(letting  light  through  them)  ;  therefore,  in  any  given  leaf, 
besides  the  intricacies  of  its  own  proper  shadows  and  fore- 
shortenings,  there  are  three  series  of  circumstances  which 
alter  or  hide  its  forms.  First,  shadows  cast  on  it  by  other 
leaves— often  very  forcibly.  Secondly,  light  reflected  from 
its  lustrous  surface,  sometimes  the  blue  of  the  sky,  sometimes 
the  white  of  clouds,  or  the  sun  itself  flashing  like  a  star. 
Thirdly,  forms  and  shadows  of  other  leaves,  seen  as  darkness 
through  the  translucent  parts  of  the  leaf  ;  a  most  important 


•278 


THE  ELEMENTS  OF  DRA  WING. 


element  of  foliage  effect,  but  wholly  neglected  by  landscape 
artists  in  general. 

The  consequence  of  all  this  is,  that  except  now  and  then  by 
chance,  the  form  of  a  complete  leaf  is  never  seen  ;  but  a  mar- 
vellous and  quaint  confusion,  very  definite,  indeed,  in  its  evi- 
dence of  direction  of  growth,  and  unity  of  action,  but  wholly 
indefinable  and  inextricable,  part  by  part,  by  any  amount  of 
patience.  You  cannot  possibly  work  it  out  in  fac  simile, 
though  you  took  a  twelvemonth's  time  to  a  tree ;  and  you 
must  therefore  try  to  discover  some  mode  of  execution  which 
will  more  or  less  imitate,  by  its  own  variety  and  mystery,  the 
variety  and  mystery  of  Nature,  without  absolute  delineation 
of  detail. 

Now  I  have  led  you  to  this  conclusion  by  observation  of 
tree  form  only,  because  in  that  the  thing  to  be  proved  is  clear- 
est. But  no  natural  object  exists  which  does  not  involve  in 
some  part  or  parts  of  it  this  inimitableness,  this  mystery  of 
quantity,  which  needs  peculiarity  of  handling  and  trick  of 
touch  to  express  it  completely.  If  leaves  are  intricate,  so  is 
moss,  so  is  foam,  so  is  rock  cleavage,  so  are  fur  and  hair,  and 
texture  of  drapery,  and  of  clouds.  And  although  methods 
and  dexterities  of  handling  are  wholly  useless  if  you  have  not 
gained  first  the  thorough  knowledge  of  the  form  of  the  thing ; 
so  that  if  you  cannot  draw  a  branch  perfectly,  then  much  less 
a  tree  ;  and  if  not  a  wreath  of  mist  perfectly,  much  less  a 
flock  of  clouds  ;  and  if  not  a  single  grass  blade  perfectly, 
much  less  a  grass  bank  ;  yet  having  once  got  this  power  over 
decisive  form,  you  may  safely — and  must,  in  order  to  perfec- 
tion of  work — carry  out  your  knowledge  by  every  aid  of  method 
and  dexterity  of  hand. 

But,  in  order  to  find  out  what  method  can  do,  you  must  now 
look  at  Art  as  well  as  at  Nature,  and  see  what  means  paint- 
ers  and  engravers  have  actually  employed  for  the  expression 
of  these  subtleties.  Whereupon  arises  the  question,  what 
opportunity  have  you  to  obtain  engravings?  You  ought,  if  it 
is  at  all  in  your  power,  to  possess  yourself  of  a  certain  num- 
ber of  good  examples  of  Turner's  engraved  works  :  if  this  be 
not  in  your  power,  you  must  just  make  the  best  use  you  can 


ON  FIRST  PRACTICE. 


279 


of  the  shop  windows,  or  of  any  plates  of  which  you  can  obtain 
a  loan.  Very  possibly,  the  difficulty  of  getting  sight  of  them 
may  stimulate  you  to  put  them  to  better  use.  But,  supposing 
your  means  admit  of  your  doing  so,  possess  yourself,  first,  of 
the  illustrated  edition  either  of  Rogers's  Italy  or  Rogers's 
Poems,  and  then  of  about  a  dozen  of  the  plates  named  in  the 
annexed  lists.  The  prefixed  letters  indicate  the  particular 
points  deserving  your  study  in  each  engraving.*    Be  sure, 

*  If  you  can,  get  first  the  plates  marked  with  a  star.  The  letters 
mean  as  follows:  — 

a  stands  for  architecture,  including  distant  grouping  of  towns,  cottages, 


c  clouds,  including  mist  and  aerial  effects, 
/'foliage. 

ft  ground,  including  low  hills,  when  not  rocky. 
I  effects  of  light. 

m  mountains,  or  bold  rocky  ground. 

p  power  of  general  arrangement  and  effect. 

q  quiet  water. 

r  running  or  rough  water ;  or  rivers,  even  if  calm,  when  their  line  of 
flow  is  beautifully  marked. 


From  tlw  England  Series. 


a  cfr. 

afl. 
a  I  q  r. 


Arundel. 

Ashby  de  la  Zouche. 
Barnard  Castle.  * 
Bolton  Abbey. 
Buckf  astleigh.  * 
Caernarvon. 
Castle  Upnor. 
Colchester. 
Cowes. 

Dartmouth  Cove. 
Flint  Castle.* 
Knaresborough.  * 
High  Force  of  Tees.  * 


afq.  Trematon. 
afp.  Lancaster. 


elm  r.  Lancaster  Sands.* 


/  m  r. 

/>*• 
a  I  p. 
c  I  q. 
afl 
Iq. 
cfP- 
c  I  q. 
afgl 


a  gf.  Launceston. 
cflr.  Leicester  Abbey. 
f  r.  Ludlow. 
afl.  Margate. 
a  I  q.  Orford. 
cp.  Plymouth. 


f.  Powis  Castle. 
I  ni  q.  Prudhoe  Castle. 


flmr.  Chain  Bridge  over  Tees  * 


m  r. 


m  q.  Ulleswater. 


/  m.  Valle  Crucis. 


From  ilie  Keepsake. 


mp  q. 
m. 


Arona. 

Drachenfells. 
Marley.* 


p.  St.  Germain  en  Laye. 
I  p  q.  Florence. 
I  m.  Bally  burgh  Ness.  * 


280 


THE  ELEMENTS  OF  BRA  WING. 


therefore,  that  your  selection  includes,  at  all  events,  one  plate 
marked  with  each  letter — of  course  the  plates  marked  with  two 
or  three  letters  are,  for  the  most  part,  the  best.  Do  not  get 
more  than  twelve  of  these  plates,  nor  even  all  the  twelve  at  first. 
For  the  more  engravings  you  have,  the  less  attention  you 
will  pay  to  them.  It  is  a  general  truth,  that  the  enjoyment 
derivable  from  art  cannot  be  increased  in  quantity,  beyond  a 
certain  point,  by  quantity  of  possession  ;  it  is  only  spread,  as 
it  were,  over  a  larger  surface,  and  very  often  dulled  by  find- 
ing ideas  repeated  in  different  works.  Now,  for  a  beginner, 
it  is  always  better  that  his  attention  should  be  concentrated 
on  one  or  two  good  things,  and  all  his  enjoyment  founded  on 
them,  than  that  he  should  look  at  many,  with  divided  thoughts. 
He  has  much  to  discover ;  and  his  best  way  of  discovering  it 
is  to  think  long  over  few  things,  and  wTatch  them  earnestly.  It 
is  one  of  the  worst  errors  of  this  age  to  try  to  know  and  to 
see  too  much  :  the  men  who  seem  to  know  everything,  never 
in  reality  know  anything  rightly.  Beware  of  hand-book  knowl- 
edge. 

These  engravings  are,  in  general,  more  for  you  to  look  at 


From  tlie  Bible  Series. 

f  m.  Mount  Lebanon.  a  c  g.  Joppa. 

m.  Rock  of  Moses  at  Sinai.  dp  q.  Solomons  Pools." 

a  I  m.  Jericho.  a  I.  Santa  Saba. 

a  L  Pool  of  Bethesda. 


From  Scotfs  Works. 

p  r.  Melrose.  c  m,  Glencoe. 

/  r.  Dry  burgh.  *  c  m.  Loch  Coriskin. 

a  I.  Caerlaveroek. 


From  the  "Rive 

a  q.  Chateau  of  Amboise,  with 
large  bridge  on  right. 

Ipr.  Rouen,  looking  down  the 
river,  poplar^  on  right.* 

a  I  p.  Rouen,  with  cathedral  and 

rainbow,  avenue  on  the  left 


rs  of  France." 

a  p.  Rouen  Cathedral. 
f  p.  Pont  de  I'Arehe. 
flp.  View  on  the  Seine,  with 

avenue. 
a  c  p.  Bridge  of  Meulan. 
.  c  gp  r.  Caudebec.  * 


ON  FIRST  PRACTICE. 


281 


than  to  cop}' ;  and  they  will  be  of  more  use  to  you  when  we 
come  to  talk  of  composition,  than  they  are  at  present ;  still,  it 
will  do  you  a  great  deal  of  good,  sometimes  to  try  how  far 
you  can  get  their  delicate  texture,  or  gradations  of  tone  ;  as 
your  pen-and-ink  drawing  will  be  apt  to  incline  too  much  to 
a  scratchy  and  broken  kind  of  shade.  For  instance,  the  text- 
ure of  the  white  convent  wall,  and  the  drawing  of  its  tiled 
roof,  in  the  vignette  at  p.  227.  of  Kogers's  Poems,  is  as  ex- 
quisite as  work  can  possibly  be  ;  and  it  will  be  a  great  and 
profitable  achievement  if  you  can  at  all  approach  it.  In  like 
manner,  if  you  can  at  all  imitate  the  dark  distant  country  at 
p.  7.,  or  the  sky  at  p.  80.,  of  the  same  volume,  or  the  foliage 
at  pp.  12.  and  144.,  it  will  be  good  gain  ;  and  if  you  can  once 
draw  the  rolling  clouds  and  running  river  at  p.  9.  of  the 
"  Italy,"  or  the  city  in  the  vignette  of  Aosta  at  p.  25.,  or  the 
moonlight  at  p.  223.,  you  will  find  that  even  Nature  herself 
cannot  afterwards  very  terribly  puzzle  you  with  her  torrents, 
or  towers,  or  moonlight. 

You  need  not  copy  touch  for  touch,  but  try  to  get  the  same 
effect.  And  if  you  feel  discouraged  by  the  delicacy  required, 
and  begin  to  think  that  engraving  is  not  drawing,  and  that 
copying  it  cannot  help  you  to  draw,  remember  that  it  differs 
from  common  drawing  only  by  the  difficulties  it  has  to  en- 
counter. You  perhaps  have  got  into  a  careless  habit  of  think- 
ing that  engraving  is  a  mere  business,  easy  enough  when  one 
has  got  into  the  knack  of  it.  On  the  contrary,  it  is  a  form  of 
drawing  more  difficult  than  common  drawing,  by  exactly  so 
much  as  it  is  more  difficult  to  cut  steel  than  to  move  the  pen- 
cil over  paper.  It  is  true  that  there  are  certain  mechanical 
aids  and  methods  which  reduce  it  at  certain  stages  either  to 
pare  machine  work,  or  to  more  or  less  a  habit  of  hand  and 
arm  ;  but  this  is  not  so  in  the  foliage  you  are  trying  to  copy, 
of  which  the  best  and  prettiest  parts  are  always  etched — that 
is,  drawTn  with  a  fine  steel  point  and  free  hand  :  only  the  line 
made  is  white  instead  of  black,  which  renders  it  much  more 
difficult  to  judge  of  what  you  are  about.  And  the  trying  to 
copy  these  plates  will  be  good  for  you,  because  it  will  awaken 
you  to  the  real  labour  and  skill  of  the  engraver,  and  make  you 


282  THE  ELEMENTS  OF  DBA  WING. 


understand  a  little  how  people  must  work,  in  this  world,  who 
have  really  to  do  anything  in  it. 

Do  not,  however,  suppose  that  I  give  you  the  engraving  as 
a  model — far  from  it ;  but  it  is  necessary  you  should  be  able 
to  do  as  well  *  before  you  think  of  doing  better,  and  you  will 
find  many  little  helps  and  hints  in  the  various  work  of  it. 
Only  remember  that  all  engravers'  foregrounds  are  bad ; 
whenever  you  see  the  peculiar  wriggling  parallel  lines  of  mod- 
ern engravings  become  distinct,  you  must  not  copy ;  nor  ad- 
mire :  it  is  only  the  softer  masses,  and  distances  ;  and  portions 
of  the  foliage  in  the  plates  marked  $  which  you  may  copy. 
The  best  for  this  purpose,  if  you  can  get  it,  is  the  "  Chain 
bridge  over  the  Tees,"  of  the  England  series  ;  the  thicket  on 
the  right  is  very  beautiful  and  instructive,  and  very  like 
Turner.  The  foliage  in  the  "Ludlow"  and  "Powis"  is  also 
remarkably  good. 

Besides  these  line  engravings,  and  to  protect  you  from  what 
harm  there  is  in  their  influence,  you  are  to  provide  yourself,  if 
possible,  with  a  Kembrandt  etching,  or  a  photograph  of  one 
(of  figures,  not  landscape).  It  does  not  matter  of  what  sub- 
ject, or  whether  a  sketchy  or  finished  one,  but  the  sketchy 
ones  are  generally  cheapest,  and  will  teach  you  most.  Copy 
it  as  well  as  you  can,  noticing  especially  that  Kembrandt's 
most  rapid  lines  have  steady  pmp>ose ;  and  that  they  are  laid 
with  almost  inconceivable  precision  when  the  object  becomes 
at  all  interesting.  The  "Prodigal  Son,"  " Death  of  the  Vir- 
gin," "  Abraham  and  Isaac,"  and  such  others,  containing  in- 
cident and  character  rather  than  chiaroscuro,  will  be  the  most 
instructive.  You  can  buy  one  ;  copy  it  well ;  then  exchange 
it,  at  little  loss,  for  another  ;  and  so,  gradually,  obtain  a  good 
knowledge  of  his  system.  Whenever  you  have  an  opportunity 
of  examining  his  work  at  museums,  &c,  do  so  with  the  great- 
est care,  not  looking  at  many  things,  but  a  long  time  at  each. 
You  must  also  provide  yourself,  if  possible,  with  an  engraving 
of  Albert  Durer's.    This  you  will  not  be  able  to  copy  ;  but 

*  As  well ; — not  as  minutely  :  the  diamond  cuts  finer  lines  on  the  steel 
than  you  can  draw  on  paper  with  your  pen  ;  but  you  must  be  able  to 
get  tones  as  even,  and  touches  as  firm. 


ON  FIRST  PRACTICE. 


283 


you  must  keep  it  beside  you,  and  refer  to  it  as  a  standard  of 
precision  in  line.  If  you  can  get  one  with  a  wing  in  it,  it  will 
be  best.  The  crest  with  the  cock,  that  with  the  skul]  and 
satyr,  and  the  "  Melancholy,"  are  the  best  you  could  have,  but 
any  will  do.  Perfection  in  chiaroscuro  drawing  lies  between 
these  two  masters,  Kembrandt  and  Durer.  Rembrandt  is 
often  too  loose  and  vague  ;  and  Durer  has  little  or  no  effect  of 
mist  or  uncertain  ty.  If  you  can  see  anywhere  a  drawing  by 
Leonardo,  you  will  find  it  balanced  between  the  two  charac- 
ters ;  but  there  are  no  engravings  which  present  this  perfec- 
tion, and  your  style  will  be  best  formed,  therefore,  by  alter- 
nate study  of  Rembrandt  and  Durer.  Lean  rather  to  Durer  ; 
it  is  better  for  amateurs  to  err  on  the  side  of  precision  than 
on  that  of  vagueness :  and  though,  as  I  have  just  said,  you 
cannot  copy  a  Durer,  yet  try  every  now  and  then  a  quarter  of 
an  inch  square  or  so,  and  see  how  much  nearer  you  can  come  ; 
you  cannot  possibly  try  to  draw  the  leafly  crown  of  the  "Mel- 
ancholia "  too  often. 

If  you  cannot  get  either  a  Rembrandt  or  a  Durer,  you  may 
still  learn  much  by  carefully  studying  any  of  George  Cruik- 
shank's  etchings,  or  Leech's  woodcuts  in  Punch,  on  the  free 
side  ;  with  Alfred  Rethel's  and  Richter's  *  on  the  severe  side. 
But  in  so  doing  you  will  need  to  notice  the  following  points  : 

When  either  the  material  (as  the  copper  or  wood)  or  the 
time  of  an  artist,  does  not  permit  him  to  make  a  perfect  draw- 
ing,— that  is  to  say,  one  in  which  no  lines  shall  be  prominently 
visible, — and  he  is  reduced  to  show  the  black  lines,  either 
drawn  by  the  pen,  or  on  the  wood,  it  is  better  to  make  these 
lines  help,  as  far  as  may  be,  the  expression  of  texture  and 
form.  You  will  thus  find  many  textures,  as  of  cloth  or  grass 
or  flesh,  and  many  subtle  effects  of  light,  expressed  by  Leech 
with  zigzag  or  crossed  or  curiously  broken  lines  ;  and  you 
will  see  that  Alfred  Rethel  and  Richter  constantly  express  the 
direction  and  rounding  of  surfaces  by  the  direction  of  the 
lines  which  shade  them.  All  these  various  means  of  expression 
will  be  useful  to  you,  as  far  as  you  can  learn  them,  provided 

*  See,  for  account  of  these  plates,  the  Appendix  on  44  Works  to  he 
studied/' 


284 


THE  ELEMENTS  OF  DMA  WING. 


you  remember  that  they  are  merely  a  kind  of  shorthand  ;  tell- 
ing certain  facts,  not  in  quite  the  right  way,  but  in  the  only 
possible  way  under  the  conditions  :  and  provided  in  any  after 
use  of  such  means,  you  never  try  to  show  your  own  dexterity  ; 
but  only  to  get  as  much  record  of  the  object  as  you  can  in  a 
given  time  ;  and  that  you  continually  make  efforts  to  go  be- 
yond shorthand,  and  draw  portions  of  the  objects  rightly. 

And  touching  this  question  of  direction  of  lines  as  indicating 
that  of  surface,  observe  these  few  points  : 

If  lines  are  to  be  distinctly  shown,  it  is  better  that,  so  far  as 
they  can  indicate  any  thing  by  their  direction,  they  should  ex- 
plain rather  than  oppose  the  general  character  of  the  object. 


Fig.  10. 


Thus,  in  the  piece  of  woodcut  from  Titian,  Fig.  10.,  the  lines 
are  serviceable  by  expressing,  not  only  the  shade  of  the  trunk, 
but  partly  also  its  roundness,  and  the  flow  of  its  grain.  And 
Albert  Durer,  whose  work  was  chiefly  engraving,  sets  himself 
always  thus  to  make  his  lines  as  valuable  as  possible ;  telling 
much  by  them,  both  of  shade  and  direction  of  surface :  and  if 
you  were  ahvays  to  be  limited  to  engraving  on  copper  (and  did 
not  want  to  express  effects  of  mist  or  darkness,  as  well  as  deli- 
cate forms),  Albert  Durer's  way  of  work  would  be  the  best  ex- 
ample for  you.  But,  inasmuch  as  the  perfect  way  of  drawing 
is  by  shade  without  lines,  and  the  great  painters  always  con- 
ceive their  subject  as  complete,  even  when  they  are  sketching 


ON  FIRST  PRACTICE. 


285 


it  most  rapidly,  you  will  find  that,  when  they  are  not  limited 
in  means,  they  do  not  much  trust  to  direction  of  line,  but  will 
often  scratch  in  the  shade  of  a  rounded  surface  with  nearly 
straight  lines,  that  is  to  say,  with  the  easiest  and  quickest  hues 
possible  to  themselves. 
When  the  hand  is  free, 
the  easiest  line  for  it  to 
draw  is  one  inclining 
from  the  left  upward  to 
the  right,  or  vice  versa, 
from  the  right  down- 
wards to  the  left ;  and 
when  done  very  quick- 
ly, the  line  is  hooked 
a  little  at  the  end  by 
the  effort  at  return  to 
the  next.  Hence,  you 
will  always  find  the  pen- 
cil, chalk,  or  pen  sketch 
of  a  very  great  master 
full  of  these  kind  of 
lines  ;  and  even  if  he 
draws  carefully,  you  will 
find  him  using  simple 
straight  lines  from  left  to 
right,  when  an  inferior 
master  will  have  used 
curved  ones.  Fig.  11.  is 
a  fair  facsimile  of  part 
of  a  sketch  of  Raphael's, 
which  exhibits  these 
characters  very  distinct- 
ly. Even  the  careful  drawings  of  Leonardo  da  Vinci  are 
shaded  most  commonly  with  straight  lines ;  and  you  may 
always  assume  it  as  a  point  increasing  the  probability  of  a 
drawing  being  by  a  great  master  if  you  find  rounded  surfaces, 
such  as  those  of  cheeks  or  lips,  shaded  with  straight  lines. 
But  you  will  also  now  understand  how  easy  it  must  be  for 


Fig.  11. 


280 


THE  ELEMENTS  OF  DRAWING. 


dishonest  dealers  to  forge  or  imitate  scrawled  sketches  like 
Figure  11.,  and  pass  litem  for  the  work  of  great  masters ;  and 
how  the  power  of  determining  the  genuineness  of  a  drawing 
depends  entirely  on  your  knowing  the  facts  of  the  object 
drawn,  and  perceiving  whether  the  hasty  handling  is  all  con- 
ducive to  the  expression  of  those  truths.  In  a  great  man's 
work,  at  its  fastest,  no  line  i3  thrown  away,  and  it  is  not  by 
the  rapidity,  but  the  economy  of  the  execution  that  you  know 
him  to  be  great.  Now  to  judge  of  this  economy,  you  must 
know  exactly  what  he  meant  to  do,  otherwise  you  cannot  of 
course  discern  how  far  he  has  done  it ;  that  is,  you  must  know 
the  beauty  and  nature  of  the  thing  he  was  drawing.  All  judg- 
ment of  art  thus  finally  founds  itself  on  knowledge  of  Nature. 

But  farther  observe,  that  this  scrawled,  or  economic,  or  im- 
petuous execution  is  never  affectedly  impetuous.  If  a  great 
man  is  not  in  a  hurry,  he  never  pretends  to  be  ;  if  he  has  no 
eagerness  in  his  heart,  he  puts  none  into  his  hand  ;  if  he 
thinks  his  effect  would  be  better  got  with  two  lines,  he  never, 
to  show  his  dexterity,  tries  to  do  it  with  one.  Be  assured, 
therefore  (and  this  is  a  matter  of  great  importance),  that  you 
will  never  produce  a  great  drawing  by  imitating  the  execution 
of  a  great  master.  Acquire  his  knowledge  and  share  his  feel- 
ings, and  the  easy  execution  will  fall  from  your  hand  as  it  did 
from  his ;  but  if  you  merely  scrawl  because  he  scrawled,  or 
blot  because  he  blotted,  you  will  not  only  never  advance  in 
power,  but  every  able  draughtsman,  and  every  judge  whose 
opinion  is  worth  having,  will  know  you  for  a  cheat,  and  de- 
spise you  accordingly. 

Again,  observe  respecting  the  use  of  outline  : 
All  merely  outlined  drawings  are  bad,  for  the  simple  reason, 
that  an  artist  of  any  power  can  always  do  more,  and  tell  more, 
by  quitting  his  outlines  occasionally,  and  scratching  in  a  few 
lines  for  shade,  than  he  can  by  restricting  himself  to  outline 
only.  Hence  the  fact  of  his  so  restricting  himself,  whatever 
may  be  the  occasion,  shows  him  to  be  a  bad  draughtsman, 
and  not  to  know  how  to  apply  his  power  economically.  This 
hard  law,  however,  bears  only  on  drawings  meant  to  remain 
in  the  state  in  which  you  see  them  ;  not  on  those  which  were 


OX  FIRST  PRACTICE. 


287 


meant  to  be  proceeded  with,  or  for  some  mechanical  use.  It 
is  sometimes  necessary  to  draw  pure  outlines,  as  an  incipient 
arrangement  of  a  composition,  to  be  filled  up  afterwards  with 
colour,  or  to  be  pricked  through  and  used  as  patterns  or 
tracings  ;  but  if,  with  no  such  ultimate  object,  making  the 
drawing  wholly  for  its  own  sake,  and  meaning  it  to  remain  in 
the  state  he  leaves  it,  an  artist  restricts  himself  to  outline,  he 
is  a  bad  draughtsman,  and  his  work  is  bad.  There  is  no  ex- 
ception to  this  law.  A  good  artist  habitually  sees  masses,  not 
edges,  and  can  in  every  case  make  his  drawing  more  expres- 
sive (with  any  given  quantity  of  work)  by  rapid  shade  than  by 
contours  ;  so  that  all  good  work  whatever  is  more  or  less 
touched  with  shade,  and  more  or  less  interrupted  as  outline. 

Hence,  the  published  works  of  Ketsch,  and  all  the  English . 
imitations  of  them,  and  all  outline  engravings  from  pictures, 
are  bad  work,  and  only  serve  to  corrupt  the  public  taste,  and 
of  such  outlines,  the  worst  are  those  which  are  darkened  in 
some  part  of  their  course  by  way  of  expressing  the  dark  side, 
as  Flaxman's  from  Dante,  and  such  others  ;  because  an  out- 
line can  only  be  true  so  long  as  it  accurately  represents  the 
form  of  the  given  object  with  one  of  its  edges. 
Thus,  the  outline  a  and  the  outline  h,  Fig.  12.,  are  JL 
both  true  outlines  of  a  ball ;  because,  however  thick  (    )  CJ 
the  line  may  be,  whether  we  take  the  interior  or 


o 


exterior  edge  of  it,  that  edge  of  it  always  draws  a 
true  circle.  But  c  is  a  false  outline  of  a  ball,  be-  Fief  12 
cause  either  the  inner  or  outer  edge  of  the  black  line 
must  be  an  untrue  circle,  else  the  line  could  not  be  thicker  in 
one  place  than  another.  Hence  all  "  force,"  as  it  is  called,  is 
gained  by  falsification  of  the  contours  ;  so  that  no  artist  whose 
eye  is  true  and  fine  could  endure  to  look  at  it.  It  does  indeed 
often  happen  that  a  painter,  sketching  rapidly,  and  trying  again 
and  again  for  some  line  which  he  cannot  quite  strike,  blackens 
or  loads  the  first  line  by  setting  others  beside  and  across  it ;  and 
then  a  careless  observer  supposes  it  has  been  thickened  on 
purpose  ;  or,  sometimes  also,  at  a  place  where  shade  is  after- 
wards to  enclose  the  form,  the  painter  will  strike  a  broad  dash 
of  this  shade  beside  his  outline  at  once,  looking  as  if  he  meant 


288 


THE  ELEMENTS  OF  DRAWING. 


to  thicken  the  outline  ;  whereas  this  broad  line  is  only  the 
first  instalment  of  the  future  shadow,  and  the  outline  is  real- 
ly drawn  with  its  inner  edge.  And  thus,  far  from  good 
draughtsmen  darkening  the  lines  which  turn  away  from  the 
light,  the  tendency  with  them  is  rather  to  darken  them  to- 
wards the  light,  for  it  is  there  in  general  that  shade  will 
ultimately  enclose  them.  The  best  example  of  this  treatment 
that  I  know  is  Raphael's  sketch,  in  the  Louvre,  of  the  head  of 
the  angel  pursuing  Heliodorus,  the  one  that  shows  part  of  the 
left  eye  ;  where  the  dark  strong  lines  which  terminate  the 
nose  and  forehead  towards  the  light  are  opposed  to  tender 
and  light  ones  behind  the  ear,  and  in  other  places  towards 
the  shade.  You  will  see  in  Fig.  11.  the  same  principle 
variously  exemplified  ;  the  principal  dark  lines,  in  the  head 
and  drapery  of  the  arms,  being  on  the  side  turned  to  the 
light. 

All  these  refinements  and  ultimate  principles,  however,  do 
not  affect  your  drawing  for  the  present.  You  must  try  to 
make  your  outlines  as  equal  as  possible  ;  and  employ  pure 
outline  only  for  the  two  following  purposes  :  either  (1.)  to 
steady  your  hand,  as  in  Exercise  II,  for  if  you  cannot  draw 
the  line  itself,  you  will  never  be  able  to  terminate  your  shadow 
in  the  precise  shape  required,  when  the  line  is  absent ;  or  (2.) 
to  give  you  shorthand  memoranda  of  forms,  when  you  are 
pressed  for  time.  Thus  the  forms  of  distant  trees  in  groups 
are  defined,  for  the  most  part,  by  the  light  edge  of  the  round- 
ed mass  of  the  nearer  one  being  shown  against  the  darker 
part  of  the  rounded  mass  of  a  more  distant  one  ;  and  to  draw 
this  properly,  nearly  as  much  work  is  required  to  round  each 
tree  as  to  round  the  stone  in  Fig.  5.  Of  course  you  cannot 
often  get  time  to  do  this  ;  but  if  you  mark  the  terminal  line 
of  each  tree  as  is  done  by  Durer  in  Fig.  13.,  you  will  get  a 
most  useful  memorandum  of  their  arrangement,  and  a  very 
interesting  drawing.  Only  observe  in  doing  this,  you  must 
not,  because  the  procedure  is  a  quick  one,  hurry  that  proced- 
ure itself.  You  will  find,  on  copying  that  bit  of  Durer,  that 
every  one  of  his  lines  is  firm,  deliberate,  and  accurately 
descriptive  as  far  as  it  goes.    It  means  a  bush  of  such  a  size 


OK  FIRST  PRACTICE. 


289 


and  such  a  shape,  definitely  observed  and  set  down  ;  it  con- 
tains a  true  "  signalement "  of  every  nut-tree,  and  apple-tree, 
and  higher  bit  of  hedge,  all  round  that  village.  If  you  have 
not  time  to  draw  thus  carefully,  do  not  draw  at  all — you  are 
merely  wasting  your  work  and  spoiling  your  taste.  When 
you  have  had  four  or  five  years'  practice  you  may  be  able  to 
make  useful  memoranda  at  a  rapid  rate,  but  not  yet  ;  except 
sometimes  of  light  and  shade,  in  a  way  of  which  I  will  tell 
vou  presently.  And  this  use  of  outline,  note  farther,  is  wholly 
confined  to  objects  which  have  edges  or  limits.    You  can  out- 


Fig.  13. 

line  a  tree  or  a  stone,  when  it  rises  against  another  tree  or 
stone  ;  but  you  cannot  outline  folds  in  drapery,  or  waves  in 
water  ;  if  these  are  to  be  expressed  at  all  it  must  be  by  some 
sort  of  shade,  and  therefore  the  rule  that  no  good  drawing  can 
consist  throughout  of  pure  outline  remains  absolute.  You 
see,  in  that  woodcut  of  Durer's,  his  reason  for  even  limiting 
himself  so  much  to  outline  as  he  has,  in  those  distant  woods 
and  plains,  is  that  he  may  leave  them  in  bright  light,  to  be 
thrown  out  still  more  by  the  dark  sky  and  the  dark  village 
spire  ;  and  the  scene  becomes  real  and  sunny  only  by  the  ad- 
dition of  these  shades. 


290  THE  ELEMENTS  OF  DRAWING. 

Understandings  then,  thus  much  of  the  use  of  outline,  we 
will  go  back  to  our  question  about  tree  drawing  left  un- 
answered at  page  60. 

We  were,  you  remember,  in  pursuit  of  mystery  among  the 
leaves.  Nov/,  it  is  quite  easy  to  obtain  mystery  and  disorder, 
to  any  extent ;  but  the  difficulty  is  to  keep  organisation  in 
the  midst  of  mystery.  And  you  will  never  succeed  in  doing 
this  unless  you  lean  always  to  the  definite  side,  and  allow  your- 
self rarely  to  become  quite  vague,  at  least  through  all  your 


r.  14.  Fig.  15. 


'early  practice.  So,  after  your  single  groups  of  leaves,  your 
first  step  must  be  to  conditions  like  Figs.  14.  and  15.,  which 
are  careful  facsimiles  of  two  portions  of  a  beautiful  woodcut 
of  Durer's,  the  Flight  into  Egypt.  Copy  these  carefully, — 
never  mind  how  little  at  a  time,  but  thoroughly  ;  then  trace 
the  Durer,  and  apply  it  to  your  drawing,  and  do  not  be  con- 
tent till  the  one  fits  the  other,  else  your  eye  is  not  true  enough 
to  carry  you  safely  through  meshes  of  real  leaves.  And  in 
the  course  of  doing  this,  you  will  find  that  not  a  line  nor  dot 
of  Durer's  can  be  displaced  without  harm  ;  that  all  add  to 


OJST  FIRST  PRACTICE. 


291 


the  effect,  and  either  express  something,  or  illumine  some- 
thing, or  relieve  something.  If,  afterwards,  you  copy  any  of 
the  pieces  of  modern  tree  drawing,  of  which  so  many  rich 
examples  are  given  constantly  in  our  cheap  illustrated  periodi- 
cals (any  of  the  Christmas  numbers  of  last  year's  Illustrated 
News  or  Times  are  full  of  them),  you  will  see  that,  though 
good  and  forcible  general  effect  is  produced,  the  lines  are 


Fig.  16. 


thrown  in  by  thousands  without  special  intention,  and  might 
just  as  well  go  one  way  as  another,  so  only  that  there  be 
enough  of  them  to  produce  all  together  a  well-shaped  effect 
of  intricacy  :  and  you  will  find  that  a  little  careless  scratch- 
ing about  with  your  pen  will  bring  you  very  near  the  same 
result  without  an  effort ;  but  that  no  scratching  of  pen,  nor 
any  fortunate  chance,  nor  anything  but  downright  skill  and 
thought,  will  imitate  so  much  as  one  leaf  of  Durer  s.  Yet 


292  THE  ELEMENTS  OF  BRA  WING. 


there  is  considerable  intricacy  and  glittering  confusion  in  the 
interstices  of  those  vine  leaves  of  his,  as  well  as  of  the  grass. 

When  you  have  got  familiarised  to  this  firm  manner,  you 
may  draw  from  Nature  as  much  as  you  like  in  the  same  way  ; 
and  when  you  are  tired  of  the  intense  care  required  for  this, 
you  may  fall  into  a  little  more  easy  massing  of  the  leaves,  as  in 
Fig.  10.  p.  66.)  This  is  facsimiled  from  an  engraving  after 
Titian,  but  an  engraving  not  quite  first-rate  in  manner,  the 
leaves  being  a  little  too  formal ;  still,  it  is  a  good  enough 
model  for  your  times  of  rest ;  and  when  you  cannot  carry  the 
thing  even  so  far  as  this,  you  may  sketch  the  forms  of  the 
masses,  as  in  Fig.  16.,*  taking  care  always  to  have  thorough 
command  over  your  hand  ;  that  is,  not  to  let  the  mass  take  a 
free  shape  because  your  hand  ran  glibly  over  the  paper,  but 
because  in  nature  it  has  actually  a  free  and  noble  shape,  and 
you  have  faithfully  followed  the  same. 

And  now  that  we  have  come  to  questions  of  noble  shape,  as 
well  as  true  shape,  and  that  we  are  going  to  draw  from  nature 
at  our  pleasure,  other  considerations  enter  into  the  business, 
which  are  by  no  means  confined  to  first  practice,  but  extend 
to  all  practice  ;  these  (as  this  letter  is  long  enough,  I  should 
think,  to  satisfy  even  the  most  exacting  of  correspondents)  I 
will  arrange  in  a  second  letter ;  praying  you  only  to  excuse 
the  tiresomeness  of  this  first  one — tiresomeness  inseparable 
from  directions  touching  the  beginning  of  any  art, — and  to 
believe  me,  even  though  I  am  trying  to  set  you  to  dull  and 
hard  work. 

Very  faithfully  yours, 

J.  Rtjskin. 

*  This  sketch  is  not  of  a  tree  standing  on  its  head,  though  it  looks  like 
it.    You  will  find  it  explained  presently. 


SKETCHING  FROM  NATURE. 


293 


LETTER  II. 

sketching  from  nature. 

My  dear  Reader  : — 

The  work  we  have  already  gone  through  together  has,  I 
hope,  enabled  you  to  draw  with  fair  success,  either  rounded 
and  simple  masses,  like  stones,  or  complicated  arrangements 
of  form,  like  those  of  leaves  ;  provided  only  these  masses  or 
complexities  will  stay  quiet  for  you  to  copy,  and  do  not  ex- 
tend into  quantity  so  great  as  to  baffle  your  patience.  But  if 
we  are  now  to  go  out  to  the  fields,  and  to  draw  anything  like 
a  complete  landscape,  neither  of  these  conditions  will  any 
more  be  observed  for  us.  The  clouds  will  not  wait  while  we 
copy  their  heaps  or  clefts  ;  the  shadows  will  escape  from  us 
as  we  try  to  shape  them,  each,  in  its  stealthy  minute  march, 
still  leaving  light  where  its  tremulous  edge  had  rested  the 
moment  before,  and  involving  in  eclipse  objects  that  had 
seemed  safe  from  its  influence ;  and  instead  of  the  small 
clusters  of  leaves  which  we  could  reckon  point  by  point,  em- 
barrassing enough  even  though  numerable,  we  have  now 
leaves  as  little  to  be  counted  as  the  sands  of  the  sea,  and 
restless,  perhaps,  as  its  foam. 

In  all  that  we  have  to  do  now,  therefore,  direct  imitation 
becomes  more  or  less  impossible.  It  is  always  to  be  aimed 
at  so  far  as  it  is  possible  ;  and  when  you  have  time  and  op- 
portunity, some  portions  of  a  landscape  may,  as  you  gain 
greater  skill,  be  rendered  with  an  approximation  almost  to 
mirrored  portraiture.  Still,  whatever  skill  you  may  reach, 
there  will  always  be  need  of  judgment  to  choose,  and  of  speed 
to  seize,  certain  things  that  are  principal  or  fugitive  ;  and  you 
must  give  more  and  more  effort  daily  to  the  observance  of 
characteristic  points,  and  the  attainment  of  concise  methods. 

I  have  directed  your  attention  early  to  foliage  for  two 
reasons.  First,  that  it  is  always  accessible  as  a  study  ;  and 
secondly,  that  its  modes  of  growth  present  simple  examples 


294 


THE  ELEMENTS  OF  DRAWING. 


of  the  importance  of  leading  or  governing  lines.  It  is  bj 
seizing  these  leading  lines,  when  we  cannot  seize  all,  that  like- 
ness and  expression  are  given  to  a  portrait,  and  grace  and  a 
kind  of  vital  truth  to  the  rendering  of  every  natural  form.  I 
call  it  vital  truth,  because  these  chief  lines  are  always  ex- 
pressive of  the  past  history  and  present  action  of  the  thing. 
They  show  in  a  mountain,  first,  how  it  was  built  or  heaped 
up  ;  and  secondly,  how  it  is  now  being  worn  away,  and  from 
what  quarter  the  wildest  storms  strike  it.  In  a  tree,  they 
show  what  kind  of  fortune  it  has  had  to  endure  from  its 
childhood  ;  how  troublesome  trees  have  come  in  its  way,  and 
pushed  it  aside,  and  tried  to  strangle  or  starve  it ;  where  and 
when  kind  trees  have  sheltered  it,  and  grown  up  lovingly 
together  with  it,  bending  as  it  bent ;  what  winds  torment  it 
most ;  what  boughs  of  it  behave  best,  and  bear  most  fruit ; 
and  so  on.  in  a  wave  or  cloud,  these  leading  lines  show  the 
run  of  the  tide  and  of  the  wind,  and  the  sort  of  change  which 
the  water  or  vapour  is  at  any  moment  enduring  in  its  form,  as 
it  meets  shore,  or  counterwave,  or  melting  sunshine.  Now 
remember,  nothing  distinguishes  great  men  from  inferior 
men  more  than  their  always,  whether  in  life  or  in  art,  knowing 
the  way  things  are  going.  Your  dunce  thinks  they  are  stand- 
ing still,  and  draws  them  all  fixed  ;  your  wise  man  sees  the 
change  or  changing  in  them,  and  draws  them  so — the  animal 
iu  its  motion,  the  tree  in  its  growth,  the  cloud  in  its  course, 
the  mountain  in  its  wearing  away.  Try  always,  whenever  you 
look  at  a  form,  to  see  the  lines  in  it  which  have  had  power 
over  its  past  fate,  and  will  have  power  over  its  futurity.  Those 
are  its  awful  lines  ;  see  that  you  seize  on  those,  whatever  else 
you  miss.  Thus,  the  leafage  in  Fig.  16.  (p.  291.)  grew  round 
the  root  of  a  stone  pine,  on  the  brow  of  a  crag  at  Sestri,  near 
Genoa,  and  all  the  sprays  of  it  are  thrust  away  in  their  first 
budding  by  the  great  rude  root,  and  spring  out  in  every 
direction  round  it,  as  water  splashes  when  a  heavy  stone  is 
thrown  into  it.  Then,  when  they  have  got  clear  of  the  root, 
they  begin  to  bend  up  again  ;  some  of  them,  being  little  stone 
pines  themselves,  have  a  great  notion  of  growing  upright,  if 
they  can  ;  and  this  struggle  of  theirs  to  recover  their  straight 


SKETCHING  FROM  NATURE.  295 

road  towards  the  sky,  after  being  obliged  to  grow  sideways 
in  their  early  years,  is  the  effort  that  will  mainly  influence 
their  future  destiny,  and  determine  if  they  are  to  be  crabbed, 
forky  pines,  striking  from  that  rock  of  Sestri,  whose  clefts 
nourish  them,  with  bared  red  lightning  of  angry  arms  towards 
the  sea  ;  or  if  they  are  to  be  goodly  and  solemn  pines,  with 
trunks  like  pillars  of  temples,  and  the  purple  burning  of  their 
branches  sheathed  in  deep  globes  of  cloudy  green.  Those, 
then,  are  their  fateful  lines  ;  see  that  you  give  that  spring  and 
resilience,  whatever  you  leave  ungiven  :  depend  upon  it,  their 
chief  beauty  is  in  these. 

So  in  trees  in  general  and  bushes,  large  or  small,  you  will 
notice  that,  though  the  boughs  spring  irregularly  and  at  vari- 
ous angles,  there  is  a  tendency  in  all  to  stoop  less  and  less  as 
they  near  the  top  of  the  tree.  This  structure,  typified  in  the 
simplest  possible  terms  at 
c,  Fig.  17.,  is  common  to 
all  trees,  that  I  know  of, 
and  it  gives  them  a  certain 
plumy  character,  and  as- 
pect of  unity  in  the  hearts 
of  their  branches,  which  are 
essential  to  their  beauty. 
The  stem  does  not  merely  send  off  a  wTild  branch  here  and 
there  to  take  its  own  way,  but  all  the  branches  share  in  one 
great  fountain-like  impulse ;  each  has  a  curve  and  a  path  to 
take  which  fills  a  definite  place,  and  each  terminates  all  its 
minor  branches  at  its  outer  extremity,  so  as  to  form  a  great 
outer  curve,  whose  character  and  proportion  are  peculiar  for 
each  species  ;  that  is  to  say,  the  general  type  or  idea  of  a  tree 
is  not  as  a,  Fig.  17.,  but  as  b,  in  which,  observe,  the  boughs 
ail  carry  their  minor  divisions  right  out  to  the  bounding 
curve  ;  not  but  that  smaller  branches,  by  thousands,  ter- 
minate in  the  heart  of  the  tree,  but  the  idea  and  main  pur- 
pose in  every  branch  are  to  carry  all  its  child  branches 
well  out  to  the  air  and  light,  and  let  each  of  them,  however 
small,  take  its  part  in  filling  the  united  flow  of  the  bounding 
curve,  so  that  the  type  of  each  separate  bough  is  again  not  a, 


296 


THE  ELEMENTS  OF  DRAWING. 


but  b,  Fig.  18.  ;  approximating,  that  is  to  say,  so  far  to  the 
structure  of  a  plant  of  broccoii  as  to  throw  the  great  mass  of 
spray  and  leafage  out  to  a  rounded  surface  ;  therefore,  beware 

of  getting  into  a  care- 
less  habit  of  drawing 
I     J  ^Sjy^J^^  boughs  with  succes- 

J^-*  iTs^         s*ve  sweePs  °f  tne  Pen 

\j£  Jf  or  brush,  one  hanging 

^  to  the  other,  as  in  Fig. 

a  FlG>  m  19.    If  you  look  at 

the  tree-boughs  in  any 
painting  of  Wilson's,  you  will  see  this  structure,  and  nearly  every 
other  that  is  to  be  avoided,  in  their  intensest  types.  You  will 
also  notice  that  "Wilson  never  conceives  a  tree  as  a  round  mass, 
but  flat,  as  if  it  had  been  pressed  and  dried.  Most  people,  in 
drawing  pines,  seem  to  fancy,  in  the  same  way,  that  the  boughs 
come  out  only  on  two  sides  of 
the  trunk,  instead  of  all  round 
it;  always,  therefore,  take  more 
pains  in  trying  to  draw  the 
boughs  of  trees  that  grow  to- 
wards you,  than  those  that  go 
off  to  the  sides  ;  anybody  can  FlG  19 

draw  the  latter,  but  the  fore- 
shortened ones  are  not  so  easy.  It  will  help  you  in  drawing  them 
to  observe  that  in  most  trees  the  ramification  of  each  branch, 
though  not  of  the  tree  itself,  is  more  or  less  flattened,  and 
approximates,  in  its  position,  to  the  look  of  a  hand  held  out 
to  receive  something,  or  shelter  something.  If  you  take  a 
looking-glass,  and  hold  your  hand  before  it  slightly  hollowed, 
with  the  palm  upwards,  and  the  fingers  open,  as  if  you  were 
going  to  support  the  base  of  some  great  bowl,  larger  than  you 
could  easily  hold,  and  sketch  your  hand  as  you  see  it  in  the 
glass,  with  the  points  of  the  fingers  towards  you,  it  will  ma- 
terially help  you  in  understanding  the  way  trees  generally 
hold  out  their  hands  ;  and  if  then  you  will  turn  yours  with  its 
palm  downwards,  as  if  you  were  going  to  try  to  hide  some- 
thing, but  with  the  fingers  expanded,  you  will  get  a  good  type 


SKETCHING  FROM  NATURE.  297 

of  the  action  of  the  lower  boughs  in  cedars  and  such  other 
spreading  trees. 

Fig.  20.  will  give  you  a  good  idea  of  the  simplest  way  in 


Fig.  20. 


which  these  and  other  such  facts  can  be  rapidly  expressed  ;  if 
you  copy  it  carefully,  you  will  be  surprised  to  find  how  the 
touches  all  group  together,  in  expressing  the  plumy  toss  of  the 
tree  branches,  and  the  springing  of  the  bushes  out  of  the  bank, 


298 


THE  ELEMENTS  OF  DRAWING. 


and  the  undulation  of  the  ground  :  note  the  careful  drawing  of 
the  footsteps  made  by  the  climbers  of  the  little  mound  on  the 
left.*  It  is  facsimiled  from  an  etching  of  Turner's,  and  is  as 
good  an  example  as  you  can  have  of  the  use  of  pure  and  firm 
lines  ;  it  will  also  show  you  how  the  particular  action  in  foli- 
age, or  anything  else  to  which  you  wish  to  direct  attention, 
may  be  intensified  by  the  adjuncts.  The  tall  and  upright  trees 
are  made  to  look  more  tall  and  upright  still,  because  their  line 
is  continued  below  by  the  figure  of  the  farmer  with  his  stick  ; 
and  the  rounded  bushes  on  the  bank  are  made  to  look  more 
rounded  because  their  line  is  continued  in  one  broad  sweep 
by  the  black  dog  and  the  boy  climbing  the  wall.  These  fig- 
ures are  placed  entirely  with  this  object,  as  we  shall  see  more 
fully  hereafter  when  we  come  to  talk  about  composition  ;  but, 
if  you  please,  we  will  not  talk  about  that  yet  awhile.  What  I 
have  been  telling  you  about  the  beautiful  lines  and  action  of 
foliage  has  nothing  to  do  with  composition,  but  only  with  fact, 
and  the  brief  and  expressive  representation  of  fact.  But  there 
will  be  no  harm  in  your  looking  forward,  if  }tou  like  to  do  so, 
to  the  account,  in  Letter  III.  of  the  "Law  of  Radiation,"  and 
reading  what  it  said  there  about  tree  growth  :  indeed  it  would 
in  some  respects  have  been  better  to  have  said  it  here  than 
there,  only  it  would  have  broken  up  the  account  of  the  princi- 
ples of  composition  somewhat  awkwaidly. 

Now,  although  the  lines  indicative  of  action  are  not  always 
quite  so  manifest  in  other  things  as  in  trees,  a  little  attention 
will  soon  enable  you  to  see  that  there  are  such  lines  in  ev- 
erything. In  an  old  house  roof,  a  bad  observer  and  bad 
draughtsman  will  only  see  and  draw  the  spotty  irregularity  of 
tiles  or  slates  all  over  ;  but  a  good  draughtsman  will  see  all  the 
bends  of  the  under  timbers,  where  they  are  weakest  and  the 
weight  is  telling  on  them  most,  and  the  tracks  of  the  run  of  the 
water  in  time  of  rain,  where  it  runs  off  fastest,  and  where  it 
lies  long  and  feeds  the  moss  ;  and  he  will  be  careful,  however 
few  slates  he  draws,  to  mark  the  way  they  bend  together  to- 
wards those  hollows  (which  have  the  future  fate  of  the  roof  in 
them),  and  crowd  gradually  together  at  the  top  of  the  gable, 
*  It  is  meant,  I  believe,  for  "Salt  Hill." 


SKETCHING  FROM  NATURE. 


299 


parity  diminishing  in  perspective,  partly,  perhaps,  diminished 
on  purpose  (they  are  so  in  most  English  old  houses)  by  the 
slate-layer.  So  in  ground,  there  is  always  the  direction  of  the 
run  of  the  water  to  be  noticed,  which  rounds  the  earth  and  cuts 
it  into  hollows  ;  and,  generally,  in  any  bank,  or  height  worth 
drawing,  a  trace  of  bedded  or  other  internal  structure  besides,, 
The  figure  20.  will  give  you  some  idea  of  the  way  in  which 
such  facts  may  be  expressed  by  a  few  lines.  Do  you  not  feel 
the  depression  in  the  ground  all  down  the  bill,  where  the  foot- 
steps are,  and  how  the  people  always  turn  to  the  left  at  the 
top,  losing  breath  a  little,  and  then  how  the  water  runs  down 
in  that  other  hollow  towards  the  valley,  behind  the  roots  of 
the  trees  ? 

Now,  I  want  you  in  your  first  sketches  from  nature  to  aim 
exclusively  at  understanding  and  representing  these  vital  facts 
of  form  ;  using  the  pen — not  now  the  steel,  but  the  quill — 
firmly  and  steadily,  never  scrawling  with  it,  but  saying  to  your- 
self before  you  lay  on  a  single  touch, — "  That  leaf  is  the  main 
one,  that  bough  is  the  guiding  one,  and  this  touch,  so  long,  so 
broad,  means  that  part  of  it," — point  or  side  or  knot,  as  the 
case  may  be.  Resolve  always,  as  you  look  at  the  thing,  what 
you  will  take,  and  what  miss  of  it,  and  never  let  your  hand  run 
away  with  you,  or  get  into  any  habit  or  method  of  touch.  If 
you  want  a  continuous  line,  your  hand  should  pass  calmly  from 
one  end  of  it  to  the  other,  without  a  tremor ;  if  you  want  a 
shaking  and  broken  line,  your  hand  should  shake,  or  break  off, 
as  easily  as  a  musician's  finger  shakes  or  stops  on  a  note  :  only 
remember  this,  that  there  is  no  general  way  of  doing  any  thing ; 
no  recipe  can  be  given  you  for  so  much  as  the  drawing  of  a 
cluster  of  grass.  The  grass  may  be  ragged  and  stiff,  or  tender 
and  flowing  ;  sunburnt  and  sheep-bitten,  or  rank  and  languid  ; 
fresh  or  dry  ;  lustrous  or  dull  :  look  at  it,  and  try  to  draw  it 
as  it  is,  and  don't  think  how  somebody  "  told  you  to  do  grass." 
So  a  stone  may  be  round  and  angular,  polished  or  rough, 
cracked  all  over  like  an  ill-glazed  teacup,  or  as  united  and 
broad  as  the  breast  of  Hercules.  It  may  be  as  flaky  as  a  wafer, 
as  powdery  as  a  field  puff-ball  ;  it  may  be  knotted  like  a  ship's 
hawser,  or  kneaded  like  hammered  iron,  or  knit  like  a  Damas- 


300 


THE  ELEMENTS  OF  DRAWING. 


cus  sabre,  or  fused  like  a  glass  bottle,  or  crystallised  like  a  hoar- 
frost, or  veined  like  a  forest  leaf :  look  at  it,  and  don't  try  to 
remember  how  anybody  told  you  to  "  do  a  stone." 

As  soon  as  you  find  that  your  hand  obeys  you  thoroughly, 
and  that  you  can  render  any  form  with  a  firmness  and  truth 
approaching  that  of  Turner's  and  Durer's  work,*  you  must  add 
a  simple  but  equally  careful  light  and  shade  to  your  pen  draw- 
ing, so  as  to  make  each  study  as  complete  as  possible  :  for 
which  you  must  prepare  yourself  thus.  Get,  if  you  have  the 
means,  a  good  impression  of  one  plate  of  Turner's  Liber  Studi- 
orum  ;  if  possible,  one  of  the  subjects  named  in  the  note  below. f 

*  I  do  not  mean  that  you  can  approach  Turner  or  Durer  in  their 
strength,  that  is  to  say,  in  their  imagination  or  power  of  design.  But 
you  may  approach  them,  by  perseverance,  in  truth  of  manner, 
f  The  following  are  the  most  desirable  plates  : 

Grande  Chartreuse.  Pembury  Mill. 

iEsacus  and  Hesperie.  Little  Devil's  Bridge. 

Cephalus  and  Procris.  River  Wye  {not  Wye  and  Severn). 

Source  of  Arveron.  Holy  Island. 

Ben  Arthur.  Clyde. 

Watermill.  Lauffenbourg. 

Hindhead  Hill.  Blair  Athol. 

Hedging  and  Ditching.  Alps  from  Grenoble. 

Dumblane  Abbey.  Raglan.    (Subject  with  quiet  brook, 

Morpeth.  trees,  and  castle  on  the  right.) 

Calais  Pier. 

If  you  cannot  get  one  of  these,  any  of  the  others  will  be  serviceable, 
except  only  the  twelve  following,  which  are  quite  useless :  — 

1.  Scene  in  Italy,  with  goats  on  a  walled  road,  and  trees  above. 

2.  Interior  of  church. 

3.  Scene  with  bridge,  and  trees  above  ;  figures  on  left,,  one  playing  a 
pipe. 

4.  Scene  with  figure  playing  on  tambourine. 

5.  Scene  on  Thames  with  high  trees,  and  a  square  tower  of  a  church 
seen  through  them. 

6.  Fifth  Plague  of  Egypt. 

7.  Tenth  Plague  of  Egypt. 

8.  Rivaulx  Abbey. 

9.  Wye  and  Severn. 

10.  Scene  with  castle  in  centre,  cows  under  trees  on  the  left. 

11.  Martello  Towers. 

12.  Calm. 

It  is  very  unlikely  that  you  should  meet  with  one  of  the  original  etch* 


SKETCH  TNG  FROM  NATURE. 


301 


If  you  cannot  obtain,  or  even  borrow  for  a  little  while,  any  of 
these  engravings,  you  must  use  a  photograph  instead  (how, 
I  will  tell  you  presently)  ;  but,  if  you  can  get  the  Turner, 
it  will  be  best.  You  will  see  that  it  is  composed  of  a  firm 
etching  in  line,  with  mezzotint  shadow  laid  over  it.  You  must 
first  copy  the  etched  part  of  it  accurately  ;  to  which  end  put 
the  print  against  the  window,  and  trace  slowly  with  the  great- 
est care  every  black  line  ;  retrace  this  on  smooth  drawing- 
paper  ;  and,  finally,  go  over  the  whole  with  your  pen,  looking 
at  the  original  plate  always,  so  that  if  you  err  at  all,  it  may 
be  on  the  right  side,  not  making  a  line  which  is  too  curved 
or  too  straight  already  in  the  tracing,  more  curved  or  more 
straight,  as  you  go  over  it,  And  in  doing  this,  never  work 
after  you  are  tired,  nor  to  "  get  the  thing  done,"  for  if  it  is 
badly  done,  it  will  be  of  no  use  to  you.  The  true  zeal  and 
patience  of  a  quarter  of  an  hour  are  better  than  the  sulky  and 
inattentive  labour  of  a  whole  day.  If  you  have  not  made  the 
touches  right  at  the  first  going  over  with  the  pen,  retouch 
them  delicately,  with  little  ink  in  your  pen,  thickening  or  rein- 

ings ;  if  you  should,  it  will  be  a  drawing-master  in  itself  alone,  for  it  is 
not  only  equivalent  to  a  pen-and-ink  drawing  by  Turner,  but  to  a  very 
careful  one  :  only  observe,  the  Source  of  Arveron,  Raglan,  and  Dum- 
blane  were  not  etched  by  Turner  ;  and  the  etchings  of  those  three  are 
not  good  for  separate  study,  though  it  is  deeply  interesting  to  see  how 
Turner,  apparantly  provoked  at  the  failure  of  the  beginnings  in  the 
Arveron  and  Raglan,  took  the  plates  up  himself,  and  either  conquered 
or  brought  into  use  the  bad  etching  by  his  marvellous  engraving.  The 
Dumblane  was,  however,  well  etched  by  Mr.  Lupton,  and  beautifully 
engraved  by  him.  The  finest  Turner  etching  is  of  an  aqueduct  with  a 
stork  standing  in  a  mountain  stream,  not  in  the  published  series  ;  and 
next  to  it,  are  the  unpublished  etchings  of  the  Via  Mala  and  Crowhurst. 
Turner  seems  to  have  been  so  fond  of  these  plates  that  he  kept  retouch- 
ing and  finishing  them,  and  never  made  up  his  mind  to  let  them  go. 
The  Via  Mala  is  certainly,  in  the  state  in  which  Turner  left  it,  the  finest 
of  the  whole  series :  its  etching  is,  as  I  said,  the  best  after  that  of  the 
aqueduct.  Figure  20..  above,  is  part  of  another  fine  unpublished  etch- 
ing, "  Windsor,  from  Salt  Hill."  Of  the  published  etchings,  the  finest 
are  the  Ben  Arthur,  iEsacus,  Cephalus,  and  Stone  Pines,  with  the  Girl 
washing  at  a  Cistern  ;  the  three  latter  are  the  more  generally  instructive. 
Hind  head  Hill.  Isis,  Jason,  and  Morpeth,  are  also  very  desirable. 


302  THE  ELEMENTS  OF  DIM  WING. 


forcing  them  as  they  need  :  you  cannot  give  too  much  care  ta 
tLe  facsimile.  Then  keep  this  etched  outline  by  you,  in  order 
to  study  at  your  ease  the  way  in  which  Turner  uses  his  line 
as  preparatory  for  the  subsequent  shadow  ;  *  it  is  only  in  get- 
ting the  two  separate  that  you  will  be  able  to  reason  on  this. 
Next,  copy  once  more,  though  for  the  fourth  time,  any  part  of 
this  etching  which  you  like,  and  put  on  the  light  and  shade 
with  the  brush,  and  any  brown  colour  that  matches  that  of  the 
plate  ;  f  working  it  with  the  point  of  the  brush  as  delicately  as 
if  you  were  drawing  with  pencil,  and  dotting  and  cross-hatching 
as  lightly  as  you  can  touch  the  paper,  till  you  get  the  grada- 
tions of  Turner's  engraving.  In  this  exercise,  as  in  the  former 
one,  a  quarter  of  an  inch  worked  to  close  resemblance  of  the 
copy  is  worth  more  than  the  whole  subject  carelessly  done. 
Not  that  in  drawing  afterwards  from  nature,  you  are  to  be 
obliged  to  finish  every  gradation  in  this  way,  but  that,  once 
having  fully  accomplished  the  drawing  something  rightry,  you 
will  thenceforward  feel  and  aim  at  a  higher  perfection  than  you 
could  otherwise  have  conceived,  and  the  brush  will  obey  you, 
and  bring  out  quickly  and  clearly  the  loveliest  results,  with  a 
submissiveness  which  it  would  have  wholly  refused  if  3rou  had 
not  put  it  to  severest  w7ork.  Nothing  is  more  strange  in  art 
than  the  way  that  chance  and  materials  seem  to  favour  you, 
when  once  you  have  thoroughly  conquered  them.  Make  your- 
self quite  independent  of  chance,  get  your  result  in  spite  of  it, 
and  from  that  day  forward  all  things  will  somehow  fall  as  you 
would  have  them.  Show  the  camel' s-hair,  and  the  colour  in 
it,  that  no  bending  nor  blotting  are  of  any  use  to  escape  }~our 
will ;  that  the  touch  and  the  shade  shall  finally  be  right,  if  it 
cost  you  a  year's  toil ;  and  from  that  hour  of  corrective  convic- 
tion, said  camel's-hair  will  bend  itself  to  all  your  wishes,  and  no 
blot  will  dare  to  transgress  its  appointed  border.  If  you  can- 
not obtain  a  print  from  the  Liber  Studiorum,  get  a  photo- 

*  You  will  find  more  notice  of  this  point  in  the  account  of  Harding's 
tree-drawing,  a  little  farther  on. 

f  The  impressions  vary  so  much  in  colour  that  no  brown  can  be  speci- 
fied. 


SKETCHING  FROM  NATURE. 


303 


graph  *  of  some  general  landscape  subject,  with  high  hills  and  a 
tillage,  or  picturesque  town,  in  the  middle  distance,  and  some 
calm  water  of  varied  character  (a  stream  with  stones  in  it,  if 
possible),  and  copy  any  part  of  it  you  like,  in  this  same  brown 
colour,  working,  as  I  have  just  directed  you  to  do  from  the 
Liber,  a  great  deal  with  the  point  of  the  brush.  You  are  un- 
der a  twofold  disadvantage  here,  however ;  first,  there  are 
portions  in  every  photograph  too  delicately  done  for  you  at 
present  to  be  at  all  able  to  copy  ;  and  secondly,  there  are  por- 
tions always  more  obscure  or  dark  than  there  would  be  in  the 
real  scene,  and  involved  in  a  mystery  which  you  will  not  be 
able,  as  yet,  to  decipher.  Both  these  characters  will  be  advan- 
tageous to  you  for  future  study,  after  you  have  gained  expe- 
rience, but  they  are  a  little  against  you  in  early  attempts  at 
tinting  ;  still  you  must  fight  through  the  difficulty,  and  get 
the  power  of  producing  delicate  gradations  with  brown  or 
grey,  like  those  of  the  photograph. 

Now  observe  ;  the  perfection  of  work  would  be  tinted  shad- 
ow, like  photography,  without  any  obscurity  or  exaggerated 
darkness  ;  and  as  long  as  your  effect  depends  in  anywise  on 
visible  lines,  your  art  is  not  perfect,  though  it  may  be  first-rate 
of  its  kind.  But  to  get  complete  results  in  tints  merely,  re- 
quires both  long  time  and  consummate  skill ;  and  you  will  find 
that  a  few  well-put  pen  lines,  with  a  tint  dashed  over  or  under 
them,  get  more  expression  of  facts  than  you  could  reach  in  any 
other  way,  by  the  same  expenditure  of  time.  The  use  of  the 
Liber  Studiorum  print  to  you  is  chiefly  as  an  example  of  the 
simplest  shorthand  of  this  kind,  a  shorthand  which  is  yet  capa- 
ble of  dealing  with  the  most  subtle  natural  effects ;  for  the 
firm  etching  gets  at  the  expression  of  complicated  details,  as 
leaves,  masonry,  textures  of  ground,  &c,  while  the  overlaid  tint 
enables  you  to  express  the  most  tender  distances  of  sky,  and 
forms  of  playing  light,  mist  or  cloud.  Most  of  the  best  draw- 
ings by  the  old  masters  are  executed  on  this  principle,  the 
touches  of  the  pen  being  useful  also  to  give  a  look  of  trans- 
parency to  shadows,  which  could  not  otherwise  be  attained 

*  You  had  better  get  such  a  photograph,  even  if  you  have  a  Liber 
print  as  well. 


304 


THE  ELEMENTS  OF  DBA  WING. 


but  by  great  finish  of  tinting ;  and  if  you  have  access  to  any 
ordinarily  good  public  gallery,  or  can  make  friends  of  any 
printsellers  who  have  folios  of  old  drawings,  or  facsimiles  of 
them,  you  will  not  be  at  a  loss  to  find  some  example  of  this 
unity  of  pen  with  tinting.  Multitudes  of  photographs  also 
are  now  taken  from  the  best  drawings  by  the  old  masters,  and 
I  hope  that  our  Mechanics'  Institutes,  and  other  societies 
organized  with  a  view  to  public  instruction,  will  not  fail  to 
possess  themselves  of  examples  of  these,  and  to  make  them 
accessible  to  students  of  drawing  in  the  vicinity  ;  a  single  print 
from  Turner's  Liber,  to  show  the  unison  of  tint  with  pen 
etching,  and  the  "  St.  Catherine,"  lately  photographed  by 
Thurston  Thompson,  from  Eaphael's  drawing  in  the  Louvre, 
to  show  the  unity  of  the  soft  tinting  of  the  stump  with  chalk, 
would  be  all  that  is  necessary,  and  would,  I  believe,  be  in 
many  cases  more  serviceable  than  a  larger  collection,  and 
certainly  than  a  whole  gallery  of  second-rate  prints.  Two 
such  examples  are  peculiarly  desirable,  because  all  other 
modes  of  drawing,  with  pen  separately,  or  chalk  separately,  or 
colour  separately,  may  be  seen  by  the  poorest  student  in  any 
cheap  illustrated  book,  or  in  shop  windows.  But  this  unity 
of  tinting  wTith  line  he  cannot  generally  see  but  by  some  es- 
pecial enquiry,  and  in  some  out  of  the  way  places  he  could 
not  find  a  single  example  of  it.  Supposing  that  this  should 
be  so  in  your  own  case,  and  that  you  cannot  meet  with  any 
example  of  this  kind,  try  to  make  the  matter  out  alone, 
thus  : 

Take  a  small  and  simple  photograph  ;  allow  yourself  half  an 
hour  to  express  its  subjects  with  the  pen  only,  using  some  per- 
manent liquid  colour  instead  of  ink,  outlining  its  buildings  or 
trees  firmly,  and  laying  in  the  deeper  shadows,  as  you  have 
been  accustomed  to  do  in  your  bolder  pen  drawings  ;  then, 
when  this  etching  is  dry,  take  your  sepia  or  grey,  and  tint  it 
over,  getting  now  the  finer  gradations  of  the  photograph  ;  and 
finally,  taking  out  the  higher  lights  with  penknife  or  blot- 
ting-paper. You  will  soon  find  what  can  be  done  in  this  way  *, 
and  by  a  series  of  experiments  you  may  ascertain  for  yourself 
how  far  the  pen  may  be  made  serviceable  to  reinforce  shadows, 


SKETCHING  FROM  NATURE. 


305 


mark  characters  of  texture,  outline  unintelligible  masses,  and 
so  on.  The  more  time  you  have,  the  more  delicate  you  may 
make  the  pen  drawing,  blending  it  with  the  tint ;  the  less  you 
have,  the  more  distinct  you  must  keep  t'he  two.  Practice  in 
this  way  from  one  photograph,  allowing  yourself  sometimes 
only  a  quarter  of  an  hour  for  the  whole  thing,  sometimes  an 
hour,  sometimes  two  or  three  hours  ;  in  each  case  drawing  the 
whole  subject  in  full  depth  of  light  and  shade,  but  with  such 
degree  of  finish  in  the  parts  as  is  possible  in  the  given  time. 
And  this  exercise,  observe,  you  will  do  well  to  repeat  fre- 
quently whether  you  can  get  prints  and  drawings  as  well  as 
photographs,  or  not. 

And  now  at  last,  when  you  can  copy  a  piece  of  Liber  Stu- 
diorum,  or  its  photographic  substitute,  faithfully,  you  have 
the  complete  means  in  your  power  of  working  from  nature  on 
all  subjects  that  interest  you,  which  you  should  do  in  four  dif- 
ferent ways. 

First.  When  you  have  full  time,  and  your  subject  is  one 
that  will  stay  quiet  for  you,  make  perfect  light  and  shade 
studies,  or  as  nearly  perfect  as  you  can,  with  grey  or  brown 
colour  of  any  kind,  reinforced  and  defined  with  the  pen. 

Secondly.  When  your  time  is  short,  or  the  subject  is  so  rich 
in  detail  that  you  feel  you  cannot  complete  it  intelligibly  in 
light  and  shade,  make  a  hasty  study  of  the  effect,  and  give  the 
3*est  of  the  time  to  a  Dureresque  expression  of  the  details.  If 
the  subject  seems  to  you  interesting,  and  there  are  points 
about  it  which  you  cannot  understand,  try  to  get  five  spare 
minutes  to  go  close  up  to  it,  and  make  a  nearer  memorandum  ; 
not  that  you  are  ever  to  bring  the  details  of  this  nearer  sketch 
into  the  farther  one,  but  that  you  may  thus  perfect  your  ex- 
perience of  the  aspect  of  things,  and  know  that  such  and  such 
a  look  of  a  tower  or  cottage  at  five  hundred  yards  off  means 
that  sort  of  tower  or  cottage  near  ;  while,  also,  this  nearer 
sketch  will  be  useful  to  prevent  any  future  misinterpretation 
of  your  own  work.  If  you  have  time,  however  far  your  light 
and  shade  study  in  the  distance  may  have  been  carried,  it  is  al- 
ways well,  for  these  reasons,  to  make  also  your  Dureresque 
and  your  near  memoranda  ;  for  if  your  light  and  shade  draw- 


306 


THE  ELEMENTS  OF  DRAWING. 


ing  be  good,  much  of  the  interesting  detail  must  be  lost  in  it, 
or  disguised. 

Your  hasty  study  of  effect  may  be  made  most  easily  and 
quickly  with  a  soft  pencil,  dashed  over  when  done  with  one 
tolerably  deep  tone  of  grey,  which  will  fix  the  pencil.  "While 
this  fixing  colour  is  wet,  take  out  the  higher  lights  with  the 
dry  brush  ;  and,  when  it  is  quite  dry,  scratch  out  the  highest 
lights  with  the  penknife.  Five  minutes,  carefully  applied,  will 
do  much  by  these  means.  Of  course  the  paper  is  to  be  white. 
I  do  not  like  studies  on  grey  paper  so  well ;  for  you  can  get 
more  gradation  by  the  taking  off  your  wet  tint,  and  laying  it 
on  cunningly  a  little  darker  here  and  there,  than  you  can  with 
body-colour  white,  unless  you  are  consummately  skilful. 
There  is  no  objection  to  your  making  your  Dureresque  mem- 
oranda on  grey  or  yellow  paper,  and  touching  or  relieving 
them  with  white  ;  only,  do  not  depend  much  on  your  white 
touches,  nor  make  the  sketch  for  their  sake. 

Thirdly.  When  you  have  neither  time  for  careful  study  nor 
for  Dureresque  detail,  sketch  the  outline  with  pencil,  then 
dash  in  the  shadows  with  the  brush  boldly,  trying  to  do  as 
much  as  you  possibly  can  at  once,  and  to  get  a  habit  of  expe- 
dition and  decision  ;  laying  more  colour  again  and  again  into 
the  tints  as  they  dry,  using  every  expedient  which  your  prac- 
tice has  suggested  to  you  of  carrying  out  your  chiaroscuro  in 
the  manageable  and  moist  material,  taking  the  colour  off 
here  with  the  dry  brush,  scratching  out  lights  in  it  there  with 
the  wooden  handle  of  the  brush,  rubbing  it  in  with  your  fin- 
gers, drying  it  off  with  your  sponge,  &c.  Then,  when  the 
colour  is  in,  take  your  pen  and  mark  the  outline  characters 
vigorously,  in  the  manner  of  the  Liber  Studiorum.  This  kind 
of  study  is  very  convenient  for  carrying  away  pieces  of  effect 
which  depend  not  so  much  on  refinement  as  on  complexity, 
strange  shapes  of  involved  shadows,  sudden  effects  of  sky,  &c. ; 
and  it  is  most  useful  as  a  safeguard  against  any  too  servile  or 
slow  habits  which  the  minute  copying  may  induce  in  you  ;  for 
although  the  endeavour  to  obtain  velocity  merely  for  velocity's 
sake,  and  dash  for  display's  sake,  is  as  baneful  as  it  is  despica- 
ble ;  there  are  a  velocity  and  a  dash  which  not  only  are  com- 


SKETCHING  FROM  NATURE.  307 

patible  with  perfect  drawing,  but  obtain  certain  results  which 
cannot  be  had  otherwise.  And  it  is  perfectly  safe  for  you  to 
study  occasionally  for  speed  and  decision,  while  your  contin- 
ual course  of  practice  is  such  as  to  ensure  your  retaining  an 
accurate  judgment  and  a  tender  touch.  Speed,  under  such 
circumstances,  is  rather  fatiguing  than  tempting  ;  and  you 
will  find  yourself  always  beguiled  rather  into  elaboration  than 
negligence. 

Fourthly.  You  will  find  it  of  great  use,  whatever  kind  of 
landscape  scenery  you  are  passing  through,  to  get  into  the 
habit  of  making  memoranda  of  the  shapes  of  shadows.  You 
will  find  that  many  objects  of  no  essential  interest  in  them- 


Fig.  21. 


selves,  and  neither  deserving  a  finished  study,  nor  a  Durer- 
esque  one,  may  yet  become  of  singular  value  in  consequence 
of  the  fantastic  shapes  of  their  shadows  ;  for  it  happens  often, 
in  distant  effect,  that  the  shadow  is  by  much  a  more  important 
element  than  the  substance.  Thus,  in  the  Alpine  bridge, 
Fig.  21.,  seen  within  a  few  yards  of  it,  as  in  the  figure,  the 
arrangement  of  timbers  to  which  the  shadows  are  owing  is 
perceptible  ;  but  at  half  a  mile's  distance,  in  bright  sunlight, 
the  timbers  would  not  be  seen  ;  and  a  good  painter's  expres- 
sion of  the  bridge  wrould  be  merely  the  large  spot,  and  the 
crossed  bars,  of  pure  grey  ;  wholly  without  indication  of  their 


308 


THE  ELEMENTS  OF  DRA  WING. 


cause,  as  in  Fig.  22.  a  ;  and  if  we  sawT  it  at  still  greater  dis- 
tances, it  would  appear,  as  in  Fig.  22.  b  and  c,  diminishing  at 
last  to  a  strange,  unintelligible,  spider-like  spot  of  grey  on 
the  light  hill-side.  A  perfectly  great  painter,  throughout  his 
distances,  continually  reduces  his  objects 
to  these  shadow  abstracts  ;  and  the  singu- 
lar, and  to  many  persons  unaccountable, 
effect  of  the  confused  touches  in  Turner's 
distances,  is  owing  chiefly  to  this  thorough 
accuracy  and  intense  meaning  of  the 
shadow  abstracts. 

Studies  of  this  kind  are  easily  made 
when  you  are  in  haste,  with  an  F.  or  HB. 
pencil :  it  requires  some  hardness  of  the 
point  to  ensure  your  drawing  delicately 
enough  when  the  forms  of  the  shadows  are 
very  subtle  ;  they  are  sure  to  be  so  some- 
where, and  are  generally  so  everywhere. 
The  pencil  is  indeed  a  very  precious  in- 
strument after  you  are  master  of  the  pen 
and  brush,  for  the  pencil,  cunningly  used, 
is  both,  and  will  draw  a  line  with  the  pre- 
cision of  the  one  and  the  gradation  of  the  other  ;  nevertheless, 
it  is  so  unsatisfactory  to  see  the  sharp  touches,  on  which  the 
best  of  the  detail  depends,  getting  gradually  deadened  by  time, 
or  to  find  the  places  where  force  was  wanted  look  shiny,  and 
like  a  fire-grate,  that  I  should  recommend  rather  the  steady 
use  of  the  pen,  or  brush,  and  colour,  whenever  time  admits  of 
it ;  keeping  only  a  small  memorandum-book  in  the  breast- 
pocket, with  its  well-cut,  sheathed  pencil,  ready  for  notes  on 
passing  opportunities  :  but  never  being  without  this. 

Thus  much,  then,  respecting  the  manner  in  which  you  are 
at  first  to  draw  from  nature.  But  it  may  perhaps  be  service- 
able to  you,  if  I  also  note  one  or  two  points  respecting  your 
choice  of  subjects  for  study,  and  the  best  special  methods  of 
treating  some  of  them  ;  for  one  of  by  no  means  the  least  dif- 
ficulties which  you  have  at  first  to  encounter  is  a  peculiar  in- 
stinct, common,  as  far  as  I  have  noticed,  to  all  beginners,  to 


Fig.  22, 


SKETCHING  FROM  NATURE. 


309 


fix  on  exactly  the  most  unmanageable  feature  in  the  given 
scene.  There  are  many  things  in  every  landscape  which  can 
be  drawn,  if  at  all,  only  by  the  most  accomplished  artists  ;  and 
I  have  noticed  that  it  is  nearly  always  these  which  a  beginner 
will  clash  at ;  or,  if  not  these,  it  will  be  something  wdiich, 
though  pleasing  to  him  in  itself,  is  unfit  for  a  picture,  and  in 
which,  when  he  has  drawn  it,  he  will  have  little  pleasure.  As 
some  slight  protection  against  this  evil  genius  of  beginners, 
the  following  general  warnings  may  be  useful : 

1.  Do  not  draw  things  that  you  love,  on  account  of  their 
associations ;  or  at  least  do  not  draw  them  because  you  love 
them  ;  but  merely  when  you  cannot  get  anything  else  to  draw. 
If  you  try  to  draw  places  that  you  love,  you  are  sure  to  be  al- 
ways entangled  amongst  neat  brick  walls,  iron  railings,  gravel 
walks,  greenhouses,  and  quickset  hedges  ;  besides  that  you 
will  be  continually  led  into  some  endeavour  to  make  your 
drawing  pretty,  or  complete,  which  will  be  fatal  to  your  prog- 
ress. You  need  never  hope  to  get  on,  if  you  are  the  least 
anxious  that  the  drawing  you  are  actually  at  work  upon 
should  look  nice  when  it  is  done.  All  you  have  to  care  about 
is  to  make  it  right,  and  to  learn  as  much  in  doing  it  as  possi- 
ble. So  then,  though  when  you  are  sitting  in  your  friend's 
parlour,  or  in  your  own,  and  have  nothing  else  to  do,  you  may 
draw  any  thing  that  is  there,  for  practice  ;  even  the  fire-irons 
or  the  pattern  on  the  carpet :  be  sure  that  it  is  for  practice,  and 
not  because  it  is  a  beloved  carpet,  nor  a  friendly  poker  and 
tongs,  nor  because  you  wish  to  please  your  friend  by  drawing 
her  room. 

Also,  never  make  presents  of  your  drawings.  Of  course  I 
am  addressing  you  as  a  beginner — a  time  may  come  when 
your  work  will  be  precious  to  everybody  ;  but  be  resolute  not 
to  give  it  away  till  you  know  that  it  is  worth  something  (as 
soon  as  it  is  worth  anything  you  will  know  that  it  is  so).  If 
any  one  asks  you  for  a  present  of  a  drawing,  send  them  a 
couple  of  cakes  of  colour  and  a  piece  of  Bristol  board  :  those 
materials  are,  for  the  present,  of  more  value  in  that  form  than 
if  you  had  spread  the  one  over  the  other. 

The  main  reason  for  this  rule  is,  however,  that  its  observ- 


310 


THE  ELEMENTS  OF  DRAW  J  NO. 


ance  will  much  protect  you  from  the  great  danger  of  trying  to 
make  your  drawings  pretty. 

2.  Never,  by  choice,  draw  anything  polished  ;  especially  if 
complicated  in  form.  Avoid  all  brass  rods  and  curtain  orna- 
ments, chandeliers,  plate,  glass,  and  fine  steel.  A  shining 
knob  of  a  piece  of  furniture  does  not  matter  if  it  comes  in 
your  way  ;  but  do  not  fret  yourself  if  it  will  not  look  right, 
and  choose  only  things  that  do  not  shine. 

3.  Avoid  all  very  neat  things.  They  are  exceedingly  diffi- 
cult to  draw,  and  very  ugly  when  drawn.  Choose  rough, 
wdrn,  and  clumsy -looking  things  as  much  as  possible  ;  for  in- 
stance, you  cannot  have  a  more  difficult  or  profitless  study 
than  a  newly-painted  Thames  wherry,  nor  a  better  study  than 
an  old  empty  coal-barge,  lying  ashore  at  low-tide  :  in  general, 
everything  that  you  think  very  ugly  wrill  be  good  for  you  to 
draw. 

4.  Avoid,  as  much  as  possible,  studies  in  which  one  thing 
is  seen  through  another.  You  will  constantly  find  a  thin  tree 
standing  before  your  chosen  cottage,  or  between  you  and  the 
turn  of  the  river  ;  its  near  branches  all  entangled  with  the 
distance.  It  is  intensely  difficult  to  represent  this  ;  and 
though,  when  the  tree  is  there,  you  must  not  imaginariiy  cut 
it  down,  but  do  it  as  well  as  you  can,  yet  always  look  for  sub- 
jects that  fall  into  definite  masses,  not  into  network  ;  that  is, 
rather  for  a  cottage  with  a  dark  tree  beside  it,  than  for  one 
with  a  thin  tree  in  front  of  it ;  rather  for  a  mass  of  wood,  soft, 
blue,  and  rounded,  than  for  a  ragged  copse,  or  confusion  of 
intricate  stems. 

5.  Avoid,  as  far  as  possible,  country  divided  by  hedges. 
Perhaps  nothing  in  the  whole  compass  of  landscape  .is  so 
utterly  unpicturesque  and  unmanageable  as  the  ordinary 
English  patchwork  of  field  and  hedge,  with  trees  dotted 
over  it  in  independent  spots,  gnawed  straight  at  the  cattle 
line. 

Still,  do  not  be  discouraged  if  you  find  you  have  chosen  ill, 
and  that  the  subject  overmasters  you.  It  is  much  better  that 
it  should,  than  that  you  should  think  you  had  entirely  mastered 
it    But  at  first,  and  even  for  some  time,  you  must  be  pre- 


SKETCHING  FROM  NATURE. 


311 


pared  for  very  discomfortable  failure  ;  which,  nevertheless, 
will  not  be  without  some  wholesome  result. 

As,  however,  I  have  told  you  what  most  definitely  to  avoid, 
I  may,  perhaps,  help  you  a  little  by  saying  what  to  seek.  In 
general,  all  banks  are  beautiful  things,  and  will  reward  work 
better  than  large  landscapes.  If  you  live  in  a  lowland  coun- 
try, you  must  look  for  places  where  the  ground  is  broken  to 
the  river's  edges,  with  decayed  posts,  or  roots  of  trees  ;  or,  if 
by  great  good  luck  there  should  be  such  things  within  your 
reach,  for  remnants  of  stone  quays  or  steps,  mossy  mill-dams, 
&c.  Nearly  every  other  mile  of  road  in  chalk  country  will 
present  beautiful  bits  of  broken  bank  at  its  sides  ;  better  in 
form  and  colour  than  high  chalk  cliffs.  In  woods,  one  or  two 
trunks,  with  the  flowery  ground  below,  are  at  once  the  richest 
and  easiest  kind  of  study :  a  not  very  thick  trunk,  say  nine 
inches  or  a  foot  in  diameter,  with  ivy  running  up  it  sparingly, 
is  an  easy,  and  always  a  rewarding  subject. 

Large  nests  of  buildings  in  the  middle  distance  are  always 
beautiful,  when  drawn  carefully,  provided  they  are  not  modern 
rows  of  pattern  cottages,  or  villas  with  Ionic  and  Doric  por~ 
ticos.  Any  old  English  village,  or  cluster  of  farm-houses, 
drawn  with  all  its  ins  and  outs,  and  haystacks,  and  palings, 
is  sure  to  be  lovely  ;  much  more  a  French  one.  French  land- 
scape is  generally  as  much  superior  to  English  as  Swiss  land- 
scape is  to  French  ;  in  some  respects,  the  French  is  incom- 
parable. Such  scenes  as  that  avenue  on  the  Seine,  which  I 
have  recommended  you  to  buy  the  engraving  of,  admit  no 
rivalship  in  their  expression  of  graceful  rusticity  and  cheerful 
peace,  and  in  the  beauty  of  component  lines. 

In  drawing  villages,  take  great  pains  with  the  gardens  ;  a 
rustic  garden  is  in  every  way  beautiful.  If  you  have  time, 
draw  all  the  rows  of  cabbages,  and  hollyhocks,  and  broken 
fences,  and  wandering  eglantines,  and  bossy  roses  :  you  can- 
not have  better  practice,  nor  be  kept  by  anything  in  pure? 
thoughts. 

Make  intimate  friends  of  all  the  brooks  in  your  neighbour- 
hood, and  study  them  ripple  by  ripple. 

Village  churches  in  England  are  not  often  good  subjects  ; 


312 


THE  ELEMENTS  OF  DRAWING. 


there  is  a  peculiar  meanness  about  most  of  them,  and  awk- 
wardness of  line.  Old  manor-houses  are  often  pretty.  Ruins 
are  usually,  with  us,  too  prim,  and  cathedrals  too  orderly.  I 
do  not  think  there  is  a  single  cathedral  in  England  from 
which  it  is  possible  to  obtain  one  subject  for  an  impressive 
drawing.  There  is  always  some  discordant  civility,  or  jarring 
vergerism  about  them. 

If  you  live  in  a  mountain  or  hill  country,  your  only  danger 
is  redundance  of  subject.  Be  resolved,  in  the  first  place,  to 
draw  a  piece  of  rounded  rock,  with  its  variegated  lichens, 
quite  rightly,  getting  its  complete  roun dings,  and  all  the  pat- 
terns of  the  lichen  in  true  local  colour.  Till  you  can  do  this, 
it  is  of  no  use  your  thinking  of  sketching  among  hills  ;  but 
when  once  you  have  done  this,  the  forms  of  distant  hills  will 
be  comparatively  easy. 

When  you  have  practised  for  a  little  time  from  such  of  these 
subjects  as  may  be  accessible  to  you,  you  will  certainly  find 
difficulties  arising  which  will  make  you  wish  more  than  ever 
for  a  master's  help  :  these  difficulties  will  vary  according  to 
the  character  of  your  own  mind  (one  question  occurring  to 
one  person,  and  one  to  another),  so  that  it  is  impossible  to 
anticipate  them  all  ;  and  it  would  make  this  too  large  a  book 
if  I  answered  all  that  I  can  anticipate  ;  you  must  be  content  to 
work  on,  in  good  hope  that  nature  will,  in  her  own  time,  in- 
terpret to  you  much  for  herself ;  that  farther  experience  on 
your  own  part  will  make  some  difficulties  disappear  ;  and  that 
others  will  be  removed  by  the  occasional  observation  of  such 
artists'  work  as  may  come  in  your  way.  Nevertheless,  I  will 
not  close  this  letter  without  a  few  general  remarks,  such  as 
may  be  useful  to  you  after  you  are  somewhat  advanced  in 
power  ;  and  these  remarks  may,  I  think,  be  conveniently  ar- 
ranged under  three  heads,  having  reference  to  the  drawing  of 
vegetation,  water,  and  skies. 

And,  first,  of  vegetation.  You  may  think,  perhaps,  we  have 
said  enough  about  trees  already  ;  yet  if  you  have  done  as  you 
were  bid,  and  tried  to  draw  them  frequently  enough,  and 
carefully  enough,  you  will  be  ready  by  this  time  to  hear  a 
little  more  of  them.    You  will  also  recollect  that  we  left  our 


SKETCHING  FROM  NATURE. 


313 


question,  respecting  the  mode  of  expressing  intricacy  of  leaf- 
age, partly  unsettled  in  the  first  letter.  I  left  it  so  because  I 
wanted  you  to  learn  the  real  structure  of  leaves,  by  drawing 
them  for  yourself,  before  I  troubled  you  with  the  most  subtle 
considerations  as  to  method  in  drawing  them.  And  by  this 
time,  I  imagine,  you  must  have  found  out  two  principal  things, 
universal  facts,  about  leaves  ;  namely,  that  they  always,  in 
the  main  tendencies  of  their  lines,  indicate  a  beautiful  diver- 
gence of  growth,  according  to  the  law  of  radiation,  already 
referred  to  ;*  and  the  second,  that  this  divergence  is  never 
formal,  but  carried  out  with  endless  variety  of  individual  line. 
I  must  now  press  both  these  facts  on  your  attention  a  little 
farther. 

You  may  perhaps  have  been  surprised  that  I  have  not  yet 
spoken  of  the  works  of  J.  D.  Harding,  especially  if  you  happen 
to  have  met  with  the  passages  referring  to  them  in  ?  Modern 
Painters, "  in  which  they  are  highly  praised.  They  are  deserv- 
edly praised,  for  they  are  the  only  works  by  a  modern 
draughtsman  which  express  in  any  wise  the  energy  of  trees, 
and  the  laws  of  growth,  of  which  we  have  been  speaking. 
There  are  no  lithographic  sketches  which,  for  truth  of  general 
character,  obtained  with  little  cost  of  time,  at  all  rival  Hard- 
ing's. Calame,  Robert,  and  the  other  lithographic  landscape 
ske tchers  are  altogether  inferior  in  power,  though  sometimes 
a  little  deeper  in  meaning.  But  you  must  not  take  even 
Harding  for  a  model,  though  you  may  use  his  works  for  occa- 
sional reference  ;  and  if  you  can  afford  to  buy  his  "  Lessons  on 
Trees,"  f  it  will  be  serviceable  to  you  in  various  ways,  and  will 
at  present  help  me  to  explain  the  point  under  consideration. 
And  it  is  well  that  I  should  illustrate  this  point  by  reference 
to  Harding's  works,  because  their  great  influence  on  young 
students  renders  it  desirable  that  their  real  character  should 
be  thoroughly  understood. 

*  See  the  closing  letter  in  this  volume. 

f  Bogue,  Fleet  Street.  If  you  are  not  acquainted  with  Harding's 
works  (an  unlikely  supposition,  considering  their  popularity),  and  can- 
not meet  with  the  one  in  question,  the  diagrams  given  here  will  enable 
you  to  understand  all  that  is  needful  for  our  purposes. 


314 


THE  ELEMENTS  OF  DRAWING. 


You  will  find,  first,  in  the  title-page  of  the  "  Lessons  on 
Trees,"  a  pretty  woodcut,  in  which  the  tree  stems  are  drawn 
with  great  truth,  and  in  a  very  interesting  arrangement  of  lines. 
Plate  1.  is  not  quite  worthy  of  Mr.  Harding,  tending  too  much 
to  make  his  pupil,  at  starting,  think  everything  depends  on 
black  dots ;  still  the  main  lines  are  good,  and  very  charac- 
teristic of  tree  growth.  Then,  in  Plate  2.,  we  come  to  the 
point  at  issue.  The  first  examples  in  that  plate  are  given  to 
the  pupil  that  he  may  practise  from  them  till  his  hand  gets 
into  the  habit  of  arranging  lines  freely  in  a  similar  manner  ; 
and  they  are  stated  by  Mr.  Harding  to  be  universal  in  appli- 
cation ;  "  all  outlines  expressive  of  foliage,"  he  says,  "  are  but 
modifications  of  them."  They  consist  of  groups  of  lines, 
more  or  less  resembling  our  Fig.  23.  ;  and  the  characters  es- 
pecially insisted  upon  are,  that  they 
"tend  at  their  inner  ends  to  a  common 
centre  ; "  that  "  their  ends  terminate  in 
[are  enclosed  by]  ovoid  curves ; "  and 
that  "  the  outer  ends  are  most  em- 
phatic." 

Now,  as  thus  expressive  of  the  great  laws  of  radiation  and 
enclosure,  the  main  principle  of  this  method  of  execution 
confirms,  in  a  very  interesting  way,  our  conclusions  respect- 
ing foliage  composition.  The  reason  of  the  last  rule,  that  the 
outer  end  of  the  line  is  to  be  most  emphatic,  does  not  indeed 
at  first  appear  ;  for  the  line  at  one  end  of  a  natural  leaf  is  not 
more  emphatic  than  the  line  at  the  other  :  but  ultimately,  in 
Harding's  method,  this  darker  part  of  the  touch  stands  more 
or  less  for  the  shade  at  the  outer  extremity  of  the  leaf  mass  ; 
and,  as  Harding  uses  these  touches,  they  express  as  much  of 
tree  character  as  any  mere  habit  of  touch  can  express.  But, 
unfortunately,  there  is  another  law  of  tree  growth,  quite  as 
fixed  as  the  law  of  radiation,  which  this  and  all  other  conven- 
tional modes  of  execution  wholly  lose  sight  of.  This  second 
law  is,  that  the  radiating  tendency  shall  be  carried  out  only 
as  a  ruling  spirit  in  reconcilement  with  perpetual  individual 
caprice  on  the  part  of  the  separate  leaves.  So  that  the  mo- 
ment a  touch  is  monotonous,  it  must  be  also  false,  the  liberty 


SKETCHING  FROM  NATURE. 


315 


of  the  leaf  individually  being  just  as  essential  a  truth,  as  its 
unity  of  growth  with  its  companions  in  the  radiating  group. 

It  does  not  matter  how  small  or  apparently  symmetrical  the 
cluster  may  be,  nor  how  large  or  vague.  "You  can  hardly 
have  a  more  formal  one 
than  b  in  Fig.  9.  p.  276., 
nor  a  less  formal  one 
than  this  shoot  of  Span- 
ish chestnut,  shedding 
its  leaves,  Fig.  24.  ;  but 
in  either  of  them,  even 
the  general  reader,  un- 
practised in  any  of  the 
previously  recommend- 
ed exercises,  must  see 
that  there  are  wandering 
lines  mixed  with  the 
radiating  ones,  and  radiating  lines  with  the  wild  ones  :  and 
if  he  takes  the  pen  and  tries  to  copy  either  of  these  ex- 
amples, he  will  find  that  neither  play  of  hand  to  left  nor  to 
right,  neither  a  free  touch  nor  a  firm  touch,  nor  any  learnable 
or  describable  touch  whatsoever,  will  enable  him  to  produce, 
currently,  a  resemblance  of  it ;  but  that  he  must  either  draw 
it  slowly,  or  give  it  up.  And  (which  makes  the  matter  worse 
still)  though  gathering  the  bough,  and  putting  it  close  to  you, 
or  seeing  a  piece  of  near  foliage  against  the  sky,  you  may 
draw  the  entire  outline  of  the  leaves,  yet  if  the  spray  has  light 
upon  it,  and  is  ever  so  little  a  way  off,  you  will  miss,  as  we 
have  seen,  a  point  of  a  leaf  here,  and  an  edge  there  ;  some  of 
the  surfaces  will  be  confused  by  glitter,  and  some  spotted 
with  shade  ;  and  if  you  look  carefully  through  this  confusion 
for  the  edges  or  dark  stems  which  you  really  can  see,  and  put 
only  those  down,  the  result  will  be  neither  like  Fig.  9.  nor 
Fig.  24.,  but  such  an  interrupted  and  puzzling  piece  of  work 
as  Fig.  25.* 

*  I  draw  this  figure  (a  young  shoot  of  oak)  in  outline  only,  it  being 
impossible  to  express  the  refinements  of  shade  in  distant  foliage  in  a 
woodcut. 


31G 


THE  ELEMENTS  OF  BRA  WING. 


Now,  it  is  in  the  perfect  acknowledgment  and  expression 
of  these  three  laws  that  all  good  drawing  of  landscape  consists. 
There  is,  first,  the  organic  unit;/;  the  law,  whether  of  radiation, 
or  parallelism,  or  concurrent  action,  which  rales  the  masses  of 
herbs  and  trees,  of  rocks,  and  clouds,  and  waves  ;  secondly,  the 
individual  liberty  of  the  members  subjected  to  these  laws  of 
unity  ;  and,  lastly,  the  mystery  under  which  the  separate  char- 
acter of  each  is  more  or  less  concealed. 

I  say,  first,  there  must  be  observance  of  the  ruling  organic 
law.  This  is  the  first  distinction  between  good  artists  and  bad 
artists.  Your  common  sketcher  or  bad  painter  puts  his  leaves 
on  the  trees  as  if  they  were  moss  tied  to  sticks  ;  he  cannot  see 
the  lines  of  action  or  grow th  ;  he  scatters  the  shapeless  clouds 
over  his  sky,  not  perceiving  the  sweeps  of  associated  curves 


Fig.  25. 


which  the  real  clouds  are  following  as  they  fly  ;  and  he  breaks 
his  mountain  side  into  rugged  fragments,  wholly  unconscious 
of  the  lines  of  force  with  which  the  real  rocks  have  risen,  or 
of  the  lines  of  couch  in  which  they  repose.  On  the  contrary, 
it  is  the  main  delight  of  the  great  draughtsman  to  trace  these 
laws  of  government  ;  and  his  tendency  to  error  is  always  in 
the  exaggeration  of  their  authority  rather  than  in  its  denial. 

Secondly,  I  say,  we  have  to  show  the  individual  character 
and  liberty  of  the  separate  leaves,  clouds,  or  rocks.  And  here- 
in the  great  masters  separate  themselves  finally  from  the 
inferior  ones  ;  for  if  the  men  of  inferior  genius  ever  express 
law  at  all,  it  is  by  the  sacrifice  of  individuality.  Thus,  Salva- 
tor  Rosa  has  great  perception  of  the  sweep  of  foliage  and 
rolling  of  clouds,  but  never  draws  a  single  leaflet  or  mist 


SKETCHING  FROM  NATURE. 


317 


wreath  accurately.  Similarly,  Gainsborough,  in  his  landscape, 
has  great  feeling  for  masses  of  form  and  harmony  of  colour ; 
but  in  the  detail  gives  nothing  but  meaningless  touches  ;  not 
even  so  much  as  the  species  of  tree,  much  less  the  variety  of 
its  leafage,  being  ever  discernable.  Now,  although  both  these 
expressions  of  government  and  individuality  are  essential  to 
masterly  work,  the  individuality  is  the  more  essential,  and  the 
more  difficult  of  attainment  ;  and,  therefore,  that  attainment 
separates  the  great  masters  finally  from  the  inferior  ones.  It 
is  the  more  essential,  because,  in  these  matters  of  beautiful 
arrangement  in  visible  things,  the  same  rules  hold  that  hold 
in  moral  things.  It  is  a  lamentable  and  unnatural  thing  to 
see  a  number  of  men  subject  to  no  government,  actuated  by 
no  ruling  principle,  and  associated  by  no  common  affection  : 
but  it  would  be  a  more  lamentable  thing  still,  were  it  possible 
to  see  a  number  of  men  so  oppressed  into  assimilation  as  to 
have  no  more  any  individual  hope  or  character,  no  differences 
in  aim,  no  dissimilarities  of 'passion,  no  irregularities  of  judg- 
ment ;  a  society  in  which  no  man  could  help  another,  since 
none  would  be  feebler  than  himself  ;  no  man  admire  another, 
since  none  would  be  stronger  than  himself  ;  no  man  be  grateful 
to  another,  since  by  none  he  could  be  relieved  ;  no  man  rever- 
ence another,  since  by  none  he  could  be  instructed  ;  a  society 
in  which  every  soul  would  be  as  the  syllable  of  a  stammerer 
instead  of  the  word  of  a  speaker,  in  which  every  man  would 
walk  as  in  a  frightful  dream,  seeing  spectres  of  himself,  in 
everlasting  multiplication,  gliding  helplessly  around  him  in  a 
speechless  darkness.  Therefore  it  is  that  perpetual  differ- 
ence, play,  and  change  in  groups  of  form  are  more  essential 
to  them  even  than  their  being  subdued  by  some  great  gather- 
ing law  :  the  law  is  needful  to  them  for  their  perfection  and 
their  power,  but  the  difference  is  needful  to  them  for  their  life. 

And  here  it  may  be  noted  in  passing,  that  if  you  enjoy  the 
pursuit  of  analogies  and  types,  and  have  any  ingenuity  of 
judgment  in  discerning  them,  you  may  always  accurately 
ascertain  what  are  the  noble  characters  in  a  piece  of  paint- 
ing, by  merely  considering  what  are  the  noble  characters 
of  man  in  his  association  with  his  fellows.    What  grace  of 


818  THE  ELEMENTS  OF  DBA  WING. 

manner  and  refinement  of  habit  are  in  society,  grace  of 
line  and  refinement  of  form  are  in  the  association  of  visi- 
ble objects.  What  advantage  or  harm  there  may  be  in  sharp- 
ness, ruggedness,  or  quaintness  in  the  dealings  or  conversa- 
tions of  men  ;  precisely  that  relative  degree  of  advantage  or 
harm  there  is  in  them  as  elements  of  pictorial  composition. 
What  power  is  in  liberty  or  relaxation  to  strengthen  or  relieve 
human  souls  ;  that  power,  precisely  in  the  same  relative 
degree,  play  and  laxity  of  line  have  to  strengthen  or  refresh 
the  expression  of  a  picture.  And  what  goodness  or  greatness 
we  can  conceive  to  arise  in  companies  of  men,  from  chastity 
of  thought,  regularity  of  life,  simplicity  of  custom,  and  bal- 
ance of  authority  ;  precisely  that  kind  of  goodness  and  great- 
ness may  be  given  to  a  picture  by  the  purity  of  its  colour,  the 
severity  of  its  forms,  and  the  symmetry  of  its  masses. 

You  need  not  be  in  the  least  afraid  of  pushing  these  analo- 
gies too  far.  They  cannot  be  pushed  too  far  ;  they  are  so 
precise  and  complete,  that  the  farther  you  pursue  them,  the 
clearer,  the  more  certain,  the  more  useful  you  will  find  them. 
They  will  not  fail  you  in  one  particular,  or  in  any  direction  of 
enquiry.  There  is  no  moral  vice,  no  moral  virtue,  which  has 
not  its  precise  prototype  in  the  art  of  painting  ;  so  that  you 
may  at  your  will  illustrate  the  moral  habit  by  the  art,  or  the 
art  by  the  moral  habit.  Affection  and  discord,  fretfulness 
and  quietness,  feebleness  and  firmness,  luxury  and  purity, 
pride  and  modesty,  and  all  other  such  habits,  and  every  con- 
ceivable modification  and  mingling  of  them,  may  be  illustrated, 
with  mathematical  exactness,  by  conditions  of  line  and  colour  ; 
and  not  merely  these  definable  vices  and  virtues,  but  also 
every  conceivable  shade  of  human  character  and  passion,  from 
the  righteous  or  unrighteous  majesty  of  the  king,  to  the  inno- 
cent or  faultful  simplicity  of  the  shepherd  boy. 

The  pursuit  of  this  subject  belongs  properly,  however,  to 
the  investigation  of  the  higher  branches  of  composition,  mat- 
ters which  it  would  be  quite  useless  to  treat  of  in  this  book  ; 
and  I  only  allude  to  them  here,  in  order  that  you  may  under- 
stand how  the  utmost  nobleness  of  art  are  concerned  in  this 
minute  work,  to  which  I  have  set  you  in  your  beginning  of  it 


SKETCHING  FROM  NATURE. 


319 


For  it  is  only  by  the  closest  attention,  and  the  most  noble 
execution,  that  it  is  possible  to  express  these  varieties  of  in- 
dividual character,  on  which  all  excellence  of  portraiture  de- 
pends, whether  of  masses  of  mankind,  or  of  groups  of  leaves. 

Now  you  will  be  able  to  understand,  among  other  matters, 
wherein  consists  the  excellence,  and  wherein  the  shortcoming, 
of  the  tree-drawing  of  Harding.  It  is  excellent  in  so  far  as  it 
fondly  observes,  with  more  truth  than  any  other  work  of  the 
kind,  the  great  laws  of  growth  and  action  in  trees  :  it  fails — 
and  observe,  not  in  a  minor,  but  in  a  principal  point — because 
it  cannot  rightly  render  any  one  individual  detail  or  incident 
of  foliage.  And  in  this  it  fails,  not  from  mere  carelessness  or 
in  completion,  but  of  necessity  ;  the  true  drawing  of  detail 
being  for  evermore  impossible  to  a  hand  which  has  contracted 
a  habit  of  execution.  The  noble  draughtsman  draws  a  leaf, 
and  stops,  and  says  calmly — That  leaf  is  of  such  and  such  a 
character  ;  I  will  give  him  a  friend  who  will  entirely  suit  him : 
then  he  considers  wrhat  his  friend  ought  to  be,  and  having 
determined,  he  draws  his  friend.  This  process  may  be  as 
quick  as  lightning  when  the  master  is  great — one  of  the  sons 
of  the  giants  ;  or  it  may  be  slow  and  timid  :  but  the  process 
is  always  gone  through  ,  no  touch  or  form  is  ever  added  to 
another  by  a  good  painter  without  a  mental  determination 
and  affirmation.  But  when  the  hand  has  got  into  a  habit, 
leaf  No.  1.  necessitates  leaf  No.  2.  ;  you  cannot  stop,  your 
hand  is  as  a  horse  with  the  bit  in  its  teeth  ;  or  rather  is,  for 
the  time,  a  machine,  throwing  out  leaves  to  order  and  pattern, 
all  alike.  You  must  stop  that  hand  of  yours,  however  pain- 
fully ;  make  it  understand  that  it  is  not  to  have  its  own  way 
any  more,  that  it  shall  never  more  slip  from  one  touch  to 
another  without  orders  ;  otherwise  it  is  not  you  who  are  the 
master,  but  your  fingers.  You  may  therefore  study  Hard- 
ing's drawing,  and  take  pleasure  in  it ;  *  and  you  may  properly 
admire  the  dexterity  wThich  applies  the  habit  of  the  hand  so 

*  His  lithographic  sketches,  those,  for  instance,  in  the  Park  and  the 
Forest,  and  his  various  lessons  on  foliage,  possess  greater  merit  than  the 
more  ambitious  engravings  in  his  u  Principles  and  Practice  of  Art. "  There 
are  many  useful  remarks,  however,  dispersed  through  this  latter  work. 


320 


THE  ELEMENTS  OF  DRA  WING. 


well,  and  produces  results  on  the  whole  so  satisfactory  :  but 
you  must  never  copy  it,  otherwise  your  progress  will  be  at 
once  arrested.  The  utmost  you  can  ever  hope  to  do,  would 
be  a  sketch  in  Harding's  manner,  but  of  far  inferior  dexter- 
ity ;  for  he  has  given  his  life's  toil  to  gain  his  dexterity,  and 
you,  I  suppose,  have  other  things  to  work  at  besides  drawing. 
You  would  also  incapacitate  yourself  from  ever  understanding 
what  truly  great  work  was,  or  what  Nature  was ;  but  by  the 
earnest  and  complete  study  of  facts,  you  will  gradually  come 
to  understand  the  one  and  love  the  other  more  and  more, 
whether  you  can  draw  well  yourself  or  not. 

I  have  yet  to  say  a  few  words  respecting  the  third  law 
above  stated,  that  of  mystery  ;  the  law,  namely,  that  nothing- 
is  ever  seen  perfectly,  but  only  by  fragments,  and  under  vari- 
ous conditions  of  obscurity.*  This  last  fact  renders  the  vis- 
ible objects  of  Nature  complete  as  a  type  of  the  human  nature. 
We  have,  observe,  first,  Subordination  ;  secondly,  Individual- 
ity ;  lastly,  and  this  not  the  least  essential  character,  Incom- 
prehensibility ;  a  perpetual  lesson  in  every  serrated  point  and 
shining  vein  which  escape  or  /deceive  our  sight  among  the 
forest  leaves,  how  little  we  may  hope  to  discern  clearly,  or 
judge  justly,  the  rents  and  veins  of  the  human  heart ;  how 
much  of  all  that  is  round  us,  in  men's  actions  or  spirits,  which 
we  at  first  think  wre  understand,  a  closer  and  more  loving- 
watchfulness  wrould  show  to  be  full  of  mystery,  never  to  be 
either  fathomed  or  withdrawn. 

The  expression  of  this  final  character  in  landscape  has  never 
been  completely  reached  by  any  except  Turner  ;  nor  can  you 
hope  to  reach  it  at  all  until  you  have  given  much  time  to  the 
practice  of  art.  Only  try  always  when  you  are  sketching  any 
object  with  a  view  to  completion  in  light  and  shade,  to  draw 
only  those  parts  of  it  which  you  really  see  definitely  ;  preparing 
for  the  after  development  of  the  forms  by  chiaroscuro.  It  is 
this  preparation  by  isolated  touches  for  a  future  arrangement 
of  superimposed  light  and  shade  which  renders  the  etchings 
of  the  Liber  Studiorum  so  inestimable  as  examples  and  so 

*  On  this  law  you  will  do  well,  if  you  can  get  access  to  it,  to  look  at 
the  fourth  chapter  of  the  fourth  volume  of  "  Modern  Painters." 


SKETCHING  FROM  NATURE. 


321 


peculiar.    The  character  exists  more  or  less  in  them  exactly 
in  proportion  to  the  pains  that  Turner  has  taken.    Thus  the 
iEsacus  and  Hesperie  was  wrought  out  with  the  greatest  pos- 
sible care  ;  and  the  princi- 
pal branch  on  the  near  tree 
is  etched  as  in  Fig.  26.  The 
work  looks  at  first  like  a 
scholar's  instead  of  a  mas- 
ter's ;  but  when  the  light 
and  shade  are  added,  every 
touch  falls  into  its  place, 
and  a  perfect  expression  of 
grace  and  complexity  re- 
sults.   Nay  even  before  the 


broken  lines,  especially 
where  the  expression  is 
given  of  the  way  the  stem 
loses  itself  in  the  leaves,  are 
more  true  than  the  monotonous  though  graceful  leaf-drawing 
which,  before  Turner's  time,  had  been  employed,  even  by  the 
best  masters,  in  their  distant  masses.  Fig.  27.  is  sufficiently 
characteristic  of  the  manner  of  the  old  woodcuts  after  Titian  ; 
in  whicfc  you  see,  the  leaves  are  too  much  of  one  shape,  like 

bunches  of  fruit ;  and  the  boughs 
too  completely  seen,  besides  be- 
ing somewhat  soft  and  leathery 
in  aspect,  owing  to  the  want  of 
angles  in  their  outline.  By  great 
men  like  Titian,  this  somewhat 
conventional  structure  was  only 
given  in  haste  to  distant  masses  ; 
and  their  exquisite  delineation 
of  the  foreground,  kept  their 
conventionalism  from  degeneracy  :  but  in  the  drawing  of 
the  Caracci  and  other  derivative  masters,  the  conventional- 


Fig.  2fL 


322 


THE  ELEMENTS  OF  DUA  WING. 


ism  prevails  everywhere,  and  sinks  gradually  into  scrawled 
work,  like  Fig.  28.,  about  the  worst  which  it  is  possible  to  get 
into  the  habit  of  using,  though  an  ignorant  person  might  per- 
haps suppose  it  more  "free/3  and  therefore  better  than  Fig. 
26.    Note,  also,  that  in  noble  outline  drawing,  it  does  not 


i«  c    \  One  point  more  remains  to 

Fl°  28-  be  noted  about  trees,  and  I 

have  done.  In  the  minds  of  our  ordinary  water-colour  artists, 
a  distant  tree  seems  only  to  be  conceived  as  a  flat  green  blot, 
grouping  pleasantly  with  other  masses,  and  giving  cool  colour 
to  the  landscape,  but  differing  nowise,  in  texture,  from  the 
blots  of  other  shapes,  which  these  painters  use  to  express  stones, 
or  water,  or  figures.  But  as  soon  as  you  have  drawn  trees 
carefully  a  little  while,  you  will  be  impressed,  and  impressed 
more  strongly  the  better  you  draw  them,  with  the  idea  of 
their  softness  of  surface.  A  distant  tree  is  not  a  flat  and  even 
piece  of  colour,  but  a  more  or  less  globular  mass  of  a  downy 
or  bloomy  texture,  partly  passing  into  a  misty  vagueness.  I 
find,  practically,  this  lovely  softness  of  far-away  trees  the  most 
difficult  of  all  characters  to  reach,  because  it  cannot  be  got  by 
mere  scratching  or  roughening  the  surface,  but  is  always  as- 
sociated with  such  delicate  expressions  of  form  and  growth 
as  are  only  imitable  by  very  careful  drawing.    The  penknife 


follow  that  a  bough  is  wrong- 
ly drawn,  because  it  looks  con- 
tracted unnaturally  some- 
where, as  in  Fig.  26.,  just 
above  the  foliage.  Very  often 
the  muscular  action  which  is 
to  be  expressed  by  the  line, 
runs  into  the  middle  of  the 
branch,  and  the  actual  outline 
of  the  branch  at  that  place  may 
be  dimly  seen,  or  not  at  all  : 
and  it  is  then  only  by  the 
future  shade  that  its  actual 
shape,  or  the  cause  of  its  dis- 
appearance, will  be  indicated. 


SKETCH  IN  0  FROM  NATURE. 


323 


passed  lightly  over  this  careful  drawing,  will  do  a  good  deal ; 
but  you  must  accustom  yourself,  from  the  beginning,  to  aim 
much  at  this  softness  in  the  lines  of  the  drawing  itself,  by 
crossing  them  delicately,  and  more  or  less  effacing  and  con- 
fusing the  edges.  You  must  invent,  according  to  the  char- 
acter of  tree,  various  modes  of  execution  adapted  to  express 
its  texture  ;  but  always  keep  this  character  of  softness  in  your 
mind  and  in  your  scope  of  aim  ;  for  in  most  landscapes  it  is  the 
intention  of  nature  that  the  tenderness  and  transparent  infini- 
tude of  her  foliage  should  be  felt,  even  at  the  far  distance,  in  the 
most  distinct  opposition  to  the  solid  masses  and  fiat  surfaces 
of  rocks  or  buildings. 

II.  We  were,  in  the  second  place,  to  consider  a  little  the 
modes  of  representing  water,  of  which  important  feature  of 
landscape  I  have  hardly  said  anything  yet. 

Water  is  expressed,  in  common  drawings,  by  conventional 
lines,  whose  horizontality  is  supposed  to  convey  the  idea  of  its 
surface.  In  paintings,  white  dashes  or  bars  of  light  are  used 
for  the  same  purpose. 

But  these  and  all  other  such  expedients  are  vain  and  ab- 
surd. A  piece  of  calm  water  always  contains  a  picture  in  it- 
self, an  exquisite  reflection  of  the  objects  above  it.  If  you 
give  the  time  necessary  to  draw  these  reflections,  disturbing 
them  here  and  there  as  you  see  the  breeze  or  current  disturb 
them,  you  will  get  the  effect  of  the  water  ;  but  if  you  have 
not  patience  to  draw  the  reflections,  no  expedient  will  give 
you  a  true  efFect.  The  picture  in  the  pool  needs  nearly  as 
much  delicate  drawing  as  the  picture  above  the  pool  ;  except 
only  that  if  there  be  the  least  motion  on  the  water,  the  hori- 
zontal lines  of  the  images  will  be  diffused  and  broken,  while 
the  vertical  ones  will  remain  decisive,  and  the  oblique  ones 
decisive  in  proportion  to  their  steepness. 

A  few  close  studies  will  soon  teach  you  this  :  the  only  thing 
you  need  to  be  told  is  to  watch  carefully  the  lines  of  disturb- 
ance on  the  surface,  as  when  a  bird  swims  across  it,  or  a  fish 
rises,  or  the  current  plays  round  a  stone,  reed,  or  other  ob- 
stacle.   Take  the  greatest  pains  to  get  the  curves  of  these 


324 


THE  ELEMENTS  OF  DRAWING. 


lines  true  ;  the  whole  value  of  your  careful  drawing  of  the  re- 
flections may  be  lost  by  your  admitting  a  single  false  curve  of 
ripple  from  a  wild  duck's  breast.  And  (as  in  other  subjects) 
if  you  are  dissatisfied  with  your  result,  always  try  for  more 
unity  and  delicacy  :  if  your  reflections  are  only  soft  and  gra- 
dated enough,  they  are  nearly  sure  to  give  you  a  pleasant 
effect.  When  you  are  taking  pains,  wrork  the  softer  reflections, 
where  they  are  drawn  out  by  motion  in  the  water,  with 
touches  as  nearly  horizontal  as  may  be  ;  but  when  you  are  in 
a  hurry,  indicate  the  place  and  play  of  the  images  with  verti- 
cal lines.  The  actual  construction  of  a  calm  elongated  reflec- 
tion is  with  horizontal  lines  :  but  it  is  often  impossible  to  draw 
the  descending  shades  delicately  enough  with  a  horizontal 
touch  ;  and  it  is  best  always  when  you  are  in  a  hurry,  and 
sometimes  when  you  are  not,  to  use  the  vertical  touch.  When 
the  ripples  are  large,  the  reflections  become  shaken,  and  must 
be  drawn  wTith  bold  modulatory  descending  lines. 

I  need  not,  I  should  think,  tell  you  that  it  is  of  the  greatest 
possible  importance  to  draw,  the  curves  of  the  shore  rightly. 
Their  perspective  is,  if  not  more  subtle,  at  least  more  strin- 
gent than  that  of  any  other  lines  in  Nature.  It  will  not  be 
detected  by  the  general  observer,  if  you  miss  the  curve  of  a 
branch,  or  the  sweep  of  a  cloud,  or  the  perspective  of  a  build- 
ing ;  *  but  every  intelligent  spectator  will  feel  the  difference 
between  a  rightly  drawn  bend  of  shore  or  shingle,  and  a  false 
one.  Absolutely  right,  in  difficult  river  perspectives  seen  from 
heights,  I  believe  no  one  but  Turner  ever  has  been  yet ;  and 
observe,  there  is  no  rule  for  them.  To  develope  the  curve 
mathematically  would  require  a  knowledge  of  the  exact  quan- 
tity of  water  in  the  river,  the  shape  of  its  bed4  and  the  hard- 
ness of  the  rock  or  shore  ;  and  even  with  these  data,  the  prob- 
lem would  be  one  which  no  mathematician  could  solve  but 
approximatively.  The  instinct  of  the  eye  can  do  it  ;  nothing 
else. 

If,  after  a  little  study  from  Nature,  you  get  puzzled  by  the 

*  The  student  may  hardly  at  first  believe  that  the  perspective  of  build- 
ings is  of  little  consequence  :  but  he  will  find  it  so  ultimately.  See  the 
remarks  on  this  point  in  the  Preface. 


SKETCHING  FROM  NATURE, 


325 


great  differences  between  the  aspect  of  the  reflected  image 
and  that  of  the  object  casting  it ;  and  if  yon  wish  to  know  the 
law  of  reflection,  it  is  simply  this  :  Suppose  all  the  objects 
above  the  water  actually  reversed  (not  in  appearance,  but  in 
fact)  beneath  the  water,  and  precisely  the  same  in  form  and 
in  relative  position,  only  all  topsy-turvy.  Then,  whatever  you 
can  see,  from  the  place  in  which  you  stand,  of  the  solid  ob- 
jects so  reversed  under  the  water,  you  will  see  in  the  reflec- 
tion, always  in  the  true  perspective  of  the  solid  objects  so  re- 
versed. 

If  you  cannot  quite  understand  this  in  looking  at  water, 
take  a  mirror,  lay  it  horizontally  on  the  table,  put  some  books 
and  papers  upon  it,  and  draw  them  and  their  reflections  ; 
moving  them  about,  and  watching  how  their  reflections  alter, 
and  chiefly  how  their  reflected  colours  and  shades  differ  from 
their  own  colours  and  shades,  by  being  brought  into  other 
oppositions.  This  difference  in  chiaroscuro  is  a  more  impor- 
tant character  in  water  painting  than  mere  difference  in  form. 

When  you  are  drawing  shallow  or  muddy  water,  you  will 
see  shadows  on  the  bottom,  or  on  the  surface,  continually 
modifying  the  reflections  ;  and  in  a  clear  mountain  stream, 
the  most  wonderful  complications  of  effect  resulting  from  the 
shadows  and  reflections  of  the  stones  in  it,  mingling  with  the 
aspect  of  the  stones  themselves  seen  through  the  water.  Do 
not  be  frightened  at  the  complexity  ;  but,  on  the  other  hand, 
do  not  hope  to  render  it  hastily.  Look  at  it  well,  making  out 
everything  that  you  see,  and  distinguishing  each  component 
part  of  the  effect.  There  will  be,  first,  the  stones  seen  through 
the  wrater,  distorted  always  by  refraction,  so  that  if  the  gen- 
eral structure  of  the  stone  shows  straight  parallel  lines  above 
the  water,  you  may  be  sure  they  will  be  bent  where  they 
enter  it  ;  then  the  reflection  of  the  part  of  the  stone  above  the 
water  crosses  and  interferes  with  the  part  that  is  seen  through 
it,  so  that  you  can  hardly  tell  which  is  which  ;  and  wTherever 
the  reflection  is  darkest,  you  will  see  through  the  water  best, 
and  vice  versa.  Then  the  real  shadow  of  the  stone  crosses 
both  these  images,  and  where  that  shadow  falls,  it  makes  the 
water  more  reflective,  and  where  the  sunshine  falls,  you  will 


326 


THE  ELEMENTS  OF  DMA  WING. 


see  more  of  the  surface  of  the  water,  and  of  any  dust  or  motea 
that  may  be  floating  on  it :  but  whether  you  are  to  see,  at  the 
same  spot,  most  of  the  bottom  of  the  water,  or  of  the  reflec- 
tion of  the  objects  above,  depends  on  the  position  of  the  eye. 
The  more  you  look  down  into  the  water,  the  better  you  see 
objects  through  it ;  the  more  you  look  along  it,  the  eye  being 
low,  the  more  you  see  the  reflection  of  objects  above  it. 
Hence  the  colour  of  a  given  space  of  surface  in  a  stream  will 
entirely  change  while  you  stand  still  in  the  same  spot,  merely 
as  you  stoop  or  raise  your  head  ;  and  thus  the  colours  with 
which  water  is  painted  are  an  indication  of  the  position  of  the 
spectator,  and  connected  inseparably  with  the  perspective  of 
the  shores.  The  most  beautiful  of  all  results  that  I  know  in 
mountain  streams  is  when  the  water  is  shallow,  and  the  stones 
at  the  bottom  are  rich  reddish-orange  and  black,  and  the 
water  is  seen  at  an  angle  which  exactly  divides  the  visible 
colours  between  those  of  the  stones  and  that  of  the  sky,  and 
the  sky  is  of  clear,  full  blue.  The  resulting  purple  obtained 
by  the  blending  of  the  blue  and  the  orange-red,  broken  by 
the  play  of  innumerable  gradations  in  the  stones,  is  indescrib- 
ably lovely. 

All  this  seems  complicated  enough  already  ;  but  if  there  be 
a  strong  colour  in  the  clear  water  itself,  as  of  green  or  blue 
in  the  Swiss  lakes,  all  these  phenomena  are  doubly  involved  ; 
for  the  darker  reflections  now  become  of  the  colour  of  the 
water.  The  reflection  of  a  black  gondola,  for  instance,  at 
Venice,  is  never  black,  but  pure  dark  green.  And,  farther, 
the  colour  of  the  water  itself  is  of  three  kinds :  one,  seen  on 
the  surface,  is  a  kind  of  milky  bloom  ;  the  next  is  seen  where 
the  waves  let  light  through  them,  at  their  edges  ;  and  the 
third,  shown  as  a  change  of  colour  on  the  objects  seen  through 
the  water.  Thus,  the  same  wave  that  makes  a  white  object 
look  of  a  clear  blue,  when  seen  through  it,  will  take  a  red  or 
violet-coloured  bloom  on  its  surface,  and  will  be  made  pure 
emerald  green  by  transmitted  sunshine  through  its  edges. 
With  all  this,  however,  you  are  not  much  concerned  at  pres- 
ent, but  I  tell  it  you  partly  as  a  preparation  for  what  we  have 
afterwards  to  say  about  colour,  and  partly  that  you  may  ap> 


SKETCHING  FROM  NATURE. 


327 


proach  lakes  and  streams  with  reverence,  and  study  them  as 
carefully  as  other  things,  not  hoping  to  express  them  by  a 
few  horizontal  dashes  of  white,  or  a  few  tremulous  blots.* 
Not  but  that  much  may  be  done  by  tremulous  blots,  when 
you  know  precisely  what  you  mean  by  them,  as  you  will  see 
by  many  of  the  Turner  sketches,  which  are  now  framed  at  the 
National  Gallery  ;  but  you  must  have  painted  water  many 
and  many  a  day — yes,  and  all  day  long — before  you  can  hope 
to  do  anything  like  those. 

III.  Lastly.  You  may  perhaps  wonder  why,  before  passing 
to  the  clouds,  I  say  nothing  special  about  ground  f  But 
there  is  too  much  to  be  said  about  that  to  admit  of  my  saying- 
it  here.  You  will  find  the  principal  laws  of  its  structure  ex- 
amined at  length  in  the  fourth  volume  of  "  Modern  Painters  ;" 
and  if  you  can  get  that  volume,  and  copy  carefully  Plate  21., 
which  I  have  etched  after  Turner  with  great  pains,  it  will 
give  you  as  much  help  as  you  need  in  the  linear  expression  of 
ground-surface.  Strive  to  get  the  retirement  and  succession 
of  masses  in  irregular  ground  :  much  may  be  done  in  this 
way  by  careful  watching  of  the  perspective  diminutions  of 
its  herbage,  as  well  as  by  contour  ;  and  much  also  by  shad- 
ows. If  you  draw  the  shadows  of  leaves  and  tree  trunks  on 
any  undulating  ground  with  entire  carefulness,  you  will  be 
surprised  to  find  how  much  they  explain  of  the  form  and  dis- 
tance of  the  earth  on  which  they  fall. 

Passing  then  to  skies,  note  that  there  is  this  great  peculiar- 
ity about  sky  subject,  as  distinguished  from  earth  subject 

*  It  is  a  useful  piece  of  study  to  dissolve  some  Prussian  blue  in  water, 
so  as  to  make  the  liquid  definitely  blue :  fill  a  large  white  basin  with 
the  solution,  and  put  anything  you  like  to  florvt  on  it,  or  lie  in  it ;  wal- 
nut shells,  bits  of  wood,  leaves  of  flowers,  &c.  Then  study  the  effects 
of  the  reflections,  and  of  the  stems  of  the  flowers  or  submerged  portions 
of  the  floating  objects,  as  they  appear  through  the  blue  liquid  ;  noting 
especially  how,  as  you  lowor  your  head  and  look  along  the  surface,  you 
see  the  reflections  clearly  ;  and  how,  as  you  raise  your  head,  you  lose 
the  reflections,  and  see  the  submerged  stems  clearly. 

f  Respecting  Architectural  Drawing,  see  the  notice  of  the  works  of 
Prout  in  the  Appendix. 


328 


THE  ELEMENTS  OF  DRA  WI1VG. 


that  the  clouds,  not  being  much  liable  to  man's  interference, 
are  always  beautifully  arranged.  You  cannot  be  sure  of  this 
in  any  other  features  of  landscape.  The  rock  on  which  the 
effect  of  a  mountain  scene  especially  depends  is  always  pre- 
cisely that  which  the  roadmaker  blasts  or  the  landlord  quar- 
ries ;  and  the  spot  of  green  which  Nature  left  with  a  special 
purpose  by  her  dark  forest  sides,  and  finished  with  her  most 
delicate  grasses,  is  always  that  which  the  farmer  ploughs  or 
builds  upon.  But  the  clouds,  though  we  can  hide  them  with 
smoke,  and  mix  them  with  poison,  cannot  be  quarried  nor 
built  over,  and  they  are  always  therefore  gloriously  arranged  ; 
so  gloriously,  that  unless  you  have  notable  powers  of  memory 
you  need  not  hope  to  approach  the  effect  of  any  sky  that  in- 
terests you.  For  both  its  grace  and  its  glow  depend  upon 
the  united  influence  of  every  cloud  within  its  compass  :  they 
all  move  and  burn  together  in  a  marvellous  harmony ;  not  a 
cloud  of  them  is  out  of  its  appointed  place,  or  fails  of  its  part 
in  the  choir  :  and  if  you  1  are  not  able  to  recollect  (which  in 
the  case  of  a  complicated  sky  it  is  impossible  you  should)  pre- 
cisely the  form  and  position  of  all  the  clouds  at  a  given  mo- 
ment, you  cannot  draw  the  sky  at  ail  ;  for  the  clouds  will  not 
fit  if  you  draw  one  part  of  them  three  or  four  minutes  before 
another.  You  must  try  therefore  to  help  what  memory  you 
have,  by  sketching  at  the  utmost  possible  speed  the  whole 
range  of  the  clouds ;  marking,  by  any  shorthand  or  symbolic 
work  you  can  hit  upon,  the  peculiar  character  of  each,  as  trans- 
parent, or  fleecy,  or  linear,  or  modulatory  ;  giving  afterwards 
such  completion  to  the  parts  as  your  recollection  will  enable 
you  to  do.  This,  however,  only  when  the  sky  is  interesting 
from  its  general  aspect ;  at  other  times,  do  not  try  to  draw 
all  the  sky,  but  a  single  cloud :  sometimes  a  round  cumulus 
will  stay  five  or  six  minutes  quite  steady  enough  to  let  you 
mark  out  his  principal  masses  :  and  one  or  two  white  or  crim- 
son lines  which  cross  the  sunrise  will  often  stay  without  se- 
rious change  for  as  long.  And  in  order  to  be  the  readier  in 
drawing  them,  practise  occasionally  drawing  lumps  of  cotton, 
which  will  teach  you  better  than  any  other  stable  thing  the 
kind  of  softness  there  is  in  clouds.    For  you  will  find  when 


SKETCHING  FROM  NATUHIH. 


329 


you  have  made  a  few  genuine  studies  of  sky,  and  then  look  at 
any  ancient  or  modern  painting,  that  ordinary  artists  have 
always  fallen  into  one  of  two  faults  :  either,  in  rounding  the 
clouds,  they  make  them  as  solid  and  hard-edged  as  a  heap  of 
stones  tied  up  in  a  sack,  or  they  represent  them  not  as 
rounded  at  all,  but  as  vague  wreaths  of  mist  or  flat  lights  in 
the  sky  ;  and  think  they  have  done  enough  in  leaving  a  little 
white  paper  between  dashes  of  blue,  or  in  taking  an  irregular 
space  out  with  the  sponge.  Now  clouds  are  not  as  solid  as 
flour-sacks  ;  bat,  on  the  other  hand,  they  are  neither  spongy 
nor  flat.  They  are  definite  and  very  beautiful  forms  of  sculpt- 
ured mist  ;  sculptured  is  a  perfectly  accurate  word  ;  they  are 
not  more  drifted  into  form  than  they  are  carved  into  form,  the 
warm  air  around  them  cutting  them  into  shape  by  absorbing 
the  visible  vapour  beyond  certain  limits  ;  hence  their  angular 
and  fantastic  outlines,  as  different  from  a  swollen,  spherical, 
or  globular  formation,  on  the  one  hand,  as  from  that  of  flat 
films  or  shapeless  mists  on  the  other.  And  the  worst  of  all 
is,  that  while  these  forms  are  difficult  enough  to  draw  on  any 
terms,  especially  considering  that  they  never  stay  quiet,  they 
must  be  drawn  also  at  greater  disadvantage  of  light  and 
shade  than  any  others,  the  force  of  light  in  clouds  being 
wholly  unattainable  by  art ;  so  that  if  we  put  shade  enough 
to  express  their  form  as  positively  as  it  is  expressed  in  reality, 
we  must  make  them  painfully  too  dark  on  the  dark  sides. 
Nevertheless,  they  are  so  beautiful,  if  you  in  the  least  succeed 
with  them,  that  you  will  hardly,  I  think,  lose  courage.  Out- 
line them  often  with  the  pen,  as  you  can  catch  them  here  and 
there  ;  one  of  the  chief  uses  of  doing  this  will  be,  not  so  much 
the  memorandum  so  obtained  as  the  lesson  you  will  get  re  - 
specting the  softness  of  the  cloud- outlines.  You  will  always 
find  yourself  at  a  loss  to  see  where  the  outline  really  is  ;  and 
when  drawn  it  will  always  look  hard  and  false,  and  will  as- 
suredly be  either  too  round  or  too  square,  however  often  you 
alter  it,  merely  passing  from  the  one  fault  to  the  other  and 
back  again,  the  real  cloud  striking  an  inexpressible  mean  be- 
tween roundness  and  squareness  in  all  its  coils  or  battlements. 
I  speak  at  present,  of  course,  only  of  the  cumulus  cloud  :  the 


330 


THE  ELEMENTS  OF  BRA  WING. 


lighter  wreaths  and  flakes  of  the  upper  sky  cannot  be  outlined  j 
— they  can  only  be  sketched,  like  locks  of  hair,  by  many  lines 
of  the  pen.  Firmly  developed  bars  of  cloud  on  the  horizon 
are  in  general  easy  enough,  and  may  be  drawn  with  decision. 
When  you  have  thus  accustomed  yourself  a  little  to  the  plac- 
ing and  action  of  clouds,  try  to  work  out  their  light  and  shade, 
just  as  carefully  as  you  do  that  of  other  things,  looking  exclu- 
sively for  examples  of  treatment  to  the  vignettes  in  Rogers's 
Italy  and  Poems,  and  to  the  Liber  Studiorum,  unless  you 
have  access  to  some  examples  of  Turner's  own  work.  No 
other  artist  ever  yet  drew  the  sky  :  even  Titian's  clouds,  and 
Tintoret's,  are  conventional.  The  clouds  in  the  "Ben  Ar- 
thur," "  Source  of  Arveron,"  and  "Calais  Pier,"  are  among 
the  best  of  Turner's  storm  studies  ;  and  of  the  upper  clouds, 
the  vignettes  to  Rogers's  Poems  furnish  as  many  examples 
as  you  need. 

And  now,  as  our  first  lesson  was  taken  from  the  sky,  so,  for 
the  present,  let  our  last  be.  I  do  not  advise  you  to  be  in  any 
haste  to  master  the  contents  of  my  next  letter.  If  you  have 
any  real  talent  for  drawing,  you  will  take  delight  in  the  dis- 
coveries of  natural  loveliness,  which  the  studies  I  have  already 
proposed  will  lead  you  into,  among  the  fields  and  hills  ;  and 
be  assured  that  the  more  quietly  and  single-heartedly  you 
take  each  step  in  the  art,  the  quicker,  on  the  whole,  will  your 
progress  be.  I  would  rather,  indeed,  have  discussed  the  sub- 
jects of  the  following  letter  at  greater  length,  and  in  a  separate 
work  addressed  to  more  advanced  students  ;  but  as  there  are 
one  or  two  things  to  be  said  on  composition  which  may  set  the 
young  artist's  mind  somewhat  more  at  rest,  or  furnish  him 
with  defence  from  the  urgency  of  ill-advisers,  I  will  glance 
over  the  main  heads  of  the  matter  here  ;  trusting  that  my  do- 
ing so  may  not  beguile  you,  my  dear  reader,  from  your  seri- 
ous work,  or  lead  you  to  think  me,  in  occupying  part  of  this 
book  with  talk  not  altogether  relevant  to  it,  less  entirely  or 

Faithfully  yours, 

J.  RUSKIN. 


ON  COLOUR  AND  COMPOSITION. 


331 


LETTER  III 

on  colour  and  composition. 

My  Dear  Reader  : — 

If  you  have  been  obedient,  and  have  hitherto  done  all 
that  I  have  told  you,  I  trust  it  has  not  been  without  much 
subdued  remonstrance,  and  some  serious  vexation.  For  I 
should  be  sorry  if,  when  you  were  led  by  the  course  of  your 
study  to  observe  closely  such  things  as  are  beautiful  in  colour, 
you  had  not  longed  to  paint  them,  and  felt  considerable  dif- 
ficulty in  complying  with  your  restriction  to  the  use  of  black, 
or  blue,  or  grey.  You  ought  to  love  colour,  and  to  think  noth- 
ing quite  beautiful  or  perfect  without  it  ;  and  if  you  really  do 
love  it,  for  its  own  sake,  and  are  not  merely  desirous  to  colour 
because  you  think  painting  a  finer  thing  than  drawing,  there 
is  some  chance  you  may  colour  wrell.  Nevertheless,  you  need 
not  hope  ever  to  produce  anything  more  than  pleasant  helps 
to  memory,  or  useful  and  suggestive  sketches  in  colour,  unless 
you  mean  to  be  wholly  an  artist.  You  may,  in  the  time  which 
other  vocations  leave  at  your  disposal,  produce  finished, 
beautiful,  and  masterly  drawings  in  light  and  shade.  But  to 
colour  well,  requires  your  life.  It  cannot  be  done  cheaper. 
The  difficulty  of  doing  right  is  increased — not  twofold  nor 
threefold,  but  a  thousandfold,  and  more— by  the  addition  of 
colour  to  your  work.  For  the  chances  are  more  than  a  thou- 
sand to  one  against  your  being  right  both  in  form  and  colour 
with  a  given  touch  :  it  is  difficult  enough  to  be  right  in  form, 
if  you  attend  to  that  only  ;  but  when  you  have  to  attend,  at 
the  same  moment,  to  a  much  more  subtle  thing  than  the  form, 
the  difficulty  is  strangely  increased — and  multiplied  almost  to 
infinity  by  this  great  fact,  that,  while  form  is  absolute,  so  that 
you  can  say  at  the  moment  you  draw  any  line  that  it  is  either 
right  or  wrong,  colour  is  wholly  relative.  Every  hue  through- 
out your  work  is  altered  by  every  touch  that  you  add  in  other 
places  ;  so  that  what  was  warm  a  minute  ago,  becomes  cold 


332 


THE  ELEMENTS  OF  BRA  WING. 


when  you  have  put  a  hotter  colour  in  another  place,  and  what 
was  in  harmony  when  you  left  it,  becomes  discordant  as  you 
set  other  colours  beside  it ;  so  that  every  touch  must  be  laid, 
not  with  a  view  to  its  effect  at  the  time,  but  with  a  view  to  its 
effect  in  futurity,  the  result  upon  it  of  all  that  is  afterwards  to 
be  done  being  previously  considered.  You  may  easily  under- 
stand that,  this  being  so,  nothing  but  the  devotion  of  life,  and 
great  genius  besides,  can  make  a  colourist. 

But  though  you  cannot  produce  finished  coloured  drawings 
of  any  value,  you  may  give  yourself  much  pleasure,  and  be  of 
great  use  to  other  people,  by  occasionally  sketching  with  a 
view  to  colour  only  ;  and  preserving  distinct  statements  of  cer- 
tain colour  facts — as  that  the  harvest-moon  at  rising  was  of 
such  and  such  a  red,  and  surrounded  by  clouds  of  such  and 
such  a  rosy  grey  ;  that  the  mountains  at  evening  were  in  truth 
so  deep  in  purple  ;  and  the  waves  by  the  boat's  side  were  in- 
deed of  that  incredible  green.  This  only,  observe,  if  you  have 
an  eye  for  colour  ;  but  you  may  presume  that  you  have  this,  if 
you  enjoy  colour. 

And,  though  of  course  you  should  always  give  as  much  form 
to  your  subject  as  your  attention  to  its  colour  will  admit  of, 
remember  that  the  whole  value  of  what  you  are  about  depends, 
in  a  coloured  sketch,  on  the  colour  merely.  If  the  colour  is 
wrong,  everything  is  wrong  :  just  as,  if  you  are  singing,  and 
sing  false  notes,  it  does  not  matter  how  true  the  words  are.  If 
you  sing  at  all,  you  must  sing  sweetly  ;  and  if  you  colour  at 
all,  you  must  colour  rightly.  Give  up  all  the  form,  rather 
than  the  slightest  part  of  the  colour  :  just  as,  if  you  felt  your- 
self in  danger  of  a  false  note,  you  would  give  up  the  word,  and 
sing  a  meaningless  sound,  if  you  felt  that  so  you  could  save 
the  note.  Never  mind  though  your  houses  are  all  tumbling 
clown — though  your  clouds  are  mere  blots,  and  your  trees 
mere  knobs,  and  your  sun  and  moon  like  crooked  sixpences — 
so  only  that  trees,  clouds,  houses,  and  sun  or  moon,  are  of  the 
right  colours.  Of  course,  the  discipline  you  have  gone  through 
will  enable  you  to  hint  something  of  form,  even  in  the  fast- 
est sweep  of  the  brush  ;  but  do  not  let  the  thought  of  form 
hamper  you  in  the  least,  when  you  begin  to  make  coloured 


ON  COLOUR  AND  COMPOSITION 


333 


memoranda.  If  you  want  the  form  of  the  subject,  draw  it  in 
black  and  white.  If  you  want  its  colour,  take  its  colour,  and 
be  sure  you  have  it,  and  not  a  spurious,  treacherous,  half- 
measured  piece  of  mutual  concession,  with  the  colours  all 
wrong,  and  the  forms  still  anything  but  right.  It  is  best  to 
get  into  the  habit  of  considering  the  coloured  work  merely  as 
supplementary  to  your  other  studies  ;  making  your  careful 
drawings  of  the  subject  first,  and  then  a  coloured  memoran- 
dum separately,  as  shapeless  as  you  like,  but  faithful  in  hue, 
and  entirely  minding  its  own  business.  This  principle,  how- 
ever, bears  chiefly  on  large  and  distant  subjects  ;  in  fore- 
grounds and  near  studies,  the  colour  cannot  be  had  without  a 
good  deal  of  definition  of  form.  For  if  you  do  not  map  the 
mosses  on  the  stones  accurately,  you  will  not  have  the  right 
quantity  of  colour  in  each  bit  of  moss  pattern,  and  then  none 
of  the  colours  will  look  right ;  but  it  always  simplifies  the  work 
much  if  you  are  clear  as  to  your  point  of  aim,  and  satisfied, 
when  necessary,  to  fail  of  all  but  that. 

Now,  of  course,  if  I  were  to  enter  into  detail  respecting 
colouring,  which  is  the  beginning  and  end  of  a  painter's  craft, 
I  should  need  to  make  this  a  work  in  three  volumes  instead  of 
three  letters,  and  to  illustrate  it  in  the  costliest  way.  I  only 
hope  at  present  to  set  you  pleasantly  and  profitably  to  work, 
leaving  you,  within  the  tethering  of  certain  leading-strings,  to 
gather  what  advantages  you  can  from  the  works  of  art  of 
which  every  year  brings  a  greater  number  within  your  reach  ; 
— and  from  the  instruction  which,  every  year,  our  rising  artists 
will  be  more  ready  to  give  kindly,  and  better  able  to  give  wisely. 

And,  first,  of  materials.  Use  hard  cake  colours,  not  moist 
colours  :  grind  a  sufficient  quantity  of  each  on  your  palette 
every  morning,  keeping  a  separate  plate,  large  and  deep,  for 
colours  to  be  used  in  broad  washes,  and  wash  both  plate  and 
palette  every  evening,  so  as  to  be  able  always  to  get  good 
and  pure  colour  when  you  need  it ;  and  force  yourself  into 
cleanly  and  orderly  habits  about  your  colours.  The  two  best 
colourists  of  modern  times,  Turner  and  Kossetti,*  afford  us,  I 

*  I  give  Rossetti  this  preeminence,  because,  though  the  leading  Pre- 
Raphaelites  have  all  about  equal  power  over  colour  in  the  abstract 


334: 


THE  ELEMENTS  OF  DRAWING. 


am  sorry  to  say,  no  confirmation  of  this  precept  by  their  prac- 
tice. Turner  was,  and  Rossetti  is,  as  slovenly  in  all  their  pro- 
cedures as  men  can  well  be  ;  but  the  result  of  this  was,  with 
Turner,  that  the  colours  have  altered  in  all  his  pictures,  and  in 
many  of  his  drawings  ;  and  the  result  of  it.  with  Rossetti  is, 
that,  though  his  colours  are  safe,  he  has  sometimes  to  throw 
aside  work  that  wTas  half  done,  and  begin  over  again.  William 
Hunt,  of  the  Old  Water-colour,  is  very  neat  in  his  practice ; 
so,  I  believe,  is  Mulready  ;  so  is  John  Lewis  ;  and  so  are  the 
leading  Pre-Raphaelites,  Rossetti  only  excepted.  And  there 
can  be  no  doubt  about  the  goodness  of  the  advice,  if  it  were 
only  for  this  reason,  that  the  more  particular  you  are  about 
your  colours  the  more  you  will  get  into  a  deliberate  and 
methodical  habit  in  using  them,  and  all  true  speed  in  colouring 
comes  of  this  deliberation. 

Use  Chinese  white,  well  ground,  to  mix  with  your  colours 
iu  order  to  pale  them,  instead  of  a  quantity  of  water.  You 
will  thus  be  able  to  shape  your  masses  more  quietly,  and  play 
the  colours  about  with  more  ease  ;  they  will  not  damp  your 
paper  so  much,  and  you  will  be  able  to  go  on  continually,  and 
lay  forms  of  passing  cloud  and  other  fugitive  or  delicately 
shaped  lights,  otherwise  unattainable  except  by  time. 

This  mixing  of  white  with  the  pigments,  so  as  to  render 
them  opaque,  constitutes  6oc/?/-colour  drawing  as  opposed  to 
transparent-colour  drawing  and  you  will,  perhaps,  have  it  often 
said  to  you  that  this  body-colour  is  "  illegitimate."  It  is  jusfc 
as  legitimate  as  oil-painting,  being,  so  far  as  handling  is  con- 
cerned, the  same  process,  only  without  its  uncleanliness,  its 
unwholesomeness,  or  its  inconvenience  ;  for  oil  will  not  dry 
quickly,  nor  carry  safely,  nor  give  the  same  effects  of  atmos- 
phere without  tenfold  labour.  And  if  you  hear  it  said  that  the 
body-colour  looks  chalky  or  opaque,  and,  as  is  very  likely, 
think  so  yourself,  be  yet  assured  of  this,  that  though  certain 

Rossetti  and  Holman  Hunt  are  distinguished  above  the  rest  for  render- 
ing colour  under  effects  of  light ;  and  of  these  two,  Rossetti  composes  with 
richer  fancy,  and  with  a  deeper  sense  of  beauty,  Hunt  s  stern  realism 
leading  him  continually  into  harshness.  Rossetti  s  carelessness,  to  do 
him  justice,  is  only  in  water-colour,  never  in  oil. 


ON  COLOUR  AND  COMPOSITION. 


335 


effects  of  glow  and  transparencies  of  gloom  are  not  to  be 
readied  without  transparent  colour,  those  glows  and  glooms 
are  not  the  noblest  aim  of  art.  After  many  years'  study  of 
the  various  results  of  fresco  and  oil  painting  in  Italy,  and  of 
body-colour  and  transparent  colour  in  England,  I  am  now  en- 
tirely convinced  that  the  greatest  things  that  are  to  be  done 
in  art  must  be  done  in  dead  colour.  The  habit  of  depending 
on  varnish  or  on  lucid  tints  transparency,  makes  the  painter 
comparatively  lose  sight  of  the  nobler  translucence  which  is 
obtained  by  breaking  various  colours  amidst  each  other  :  and 
even  when,  as  by  Correggio,  exquisite  play  of  hue  is  joined 
with  exquisite  transparency,  the  delight  in  the  depth  almost 
always  leads  the  painter  into  mean  and  false  chiaroscuro  ;  it 
leads  him  to  like  dark  backgrounds  instead  of  luminous  ones,* 
and  to  enjoy,  in  general,  quality  of  colour  more  than  grandeur 
of  composition,  and  confined  light  rather  than  open  sunshine  : 
so  that  the  really  greatest  thoughts  of  the  greatest  men  have 
always,  so  far  as  I  remember,  been  reached  in  dead  colour, 

*  All  the  degradation  of  art  which  was  brought  about,  after  the  rise 
of  the  Dutch  school,  by  asphaltum,  yellow  varnish,  and  brown  trees, 
would  have  been  prevented,  if  only  painters  had  been  forced  to  work  in 
dead  colour.  Any  colour  will  do  for  some  people,  if  it  is  browned  and 
shining  ;  but  fallacy  in  dead  colour  is  detected  on  the  instant.  I  even 
believe  that  whenever  a  painter  begins  to  icish  that  he  could  touch  any 
portion  of  his  work  with  gam,  he  is  going  wrong. 

It  is  necessary,  however,  in  this  matter,  carefully  to  distinguish  be- 
tween translucency  and  lustre.  Translucency,  though,  as  I  have  said 
above,  a  dangerous  temptation,  is,  in  its  place,  beautiful ;  but  lustre,  or 
sldniness,  is  always,  in  painting,  a  defect.  Nay,  one  of  my  best  painter- 
friends  (the  u  best "  being  understood  to  attach  to  both  divisions  of  that 
awkward  compound  word;,  tried  the  other  day  to  persuade  me  that 
lustre  was  an  ignobleness  in  anything ;  and  it  was  only  the  fear  of  trea- 
son to  ladies'  eyes,  and  to  mountain  streams,  and  to  morning  dew,  which 
kept  me  from  yielding  the  point  to  him.  One  is  apt  always  to  generalise 
too  quickly  in  such  matters  ;  but  there  can  be  no  question  that  lustre  is 
destructive  of  loveliness  in  colour,  as  it  is  of  intelligibility  in  form. 
Whatever  may  be  the  pride  of  a  young  beauty  in  the  knowledge  that 
her  eyes  shine  (though  perhaps  even  eyes  are  most  beautiful  in  dimness), 
she  would  be  sorry  if  her  cheeks  did  ;  and  which  of  us  would  wish  to 
polish  a  ro^e  ? 


338 


THE  ELEMENTS  OF  BRA  WING. 


and  the  noblest  oil  pictures  of  Tintoret  and  Veronese  are  those 
which  are  likest  frescos. 

Besides  all  this,  the  fact  is,  that  though  sometimes  a  little 
chalky  and  coarse-looking,  body-colour  is,  in  a  sketch,  infi- 
nitely liker  nature  than  transparent  colour :  the  bloom  and 
mist  of  distance  are  accurately  and  instantly  represented  by 
the  film  of  opaque  blue  {quite  accurately,  I  think,  by  nothing 
else);  and  for  ground,  rocks,  and  buildings,  the  earthy  and 
solid  surface  is,  of  course,  always  truer  than  the  most  finished 
and  carefully  wrought  work  in  transparent  tints  can  ever  be. 

Against  one  thing,  however,  I  must  steadily  caution  you. 
All  kinds  of  colour  are  equally  illegitimate,  if  you  think  they 
will  allow  you  to  alter  at  your  pleasure,  or  blunder  at  your 
ease.  There  is  no  vehicle  or  method  of  colour  which  admits 
of  alteration  or  repentance  ;  you  must  be  right  at  once,  or 
never  ;  and  you  might  as  well  hope  to  catch  a  rifle  bullet  in 
your  hand,  and  put  it  straight,  when  it  was  going  wrong,  as 
to  recover  a  tint  once  spoiled.  The  secret  of  all  good  colour 
in  oil,  wrater,  or  anything  else,  lies  primarily  in  that  sentence 
spoken  to  me  by  Mulready  :  "Know  what  you  have  to  do." 
The  process  may  be  a  long  one,  perhaps :  you  may  have  to 
ground  with  one  colour  ;  to  touch  it  with  fragments  of  a 
second  ;  to  crumble  a  third  into  the  interstices  ;  a  fourth  into 
the  interstices  of  the  third  ;  to  glaze  the  whole  with  a  fifth  ; 
and  to  reinforce  in  points  with  a  sixth :  but  whether  you 
have  one,  or  ten,  or  twenty  processes  to  go  through,  you  must 
go  straight  through  them,  knowingly  and  foreseeingly  all  the 
way  ;  and  if  you  get  the  thing  once  wrong,  there  is  no  hope 
for  you  but  in  washing  or  scraping  boldly  down  to  the  white 
ground,  and  beginning  again. 

The  drawing  in  body-colour  will  tend  to  teach  you  all  this, 
more  than  any  other  method,  and  above  all  it  will  prevent  you 
from  falling  into  the  pestilent  habit  of  sponging  to  get  text- 
ure ;  a  trick  which  has  nearly  ruined  our  modern  water-colour 
school  of  art.  There  are  sometimes  places  in  which  a  skilful 
artist  will  roughen  his  paper  a  little  to  get  certain  conditions 
of  dusty  colour  with  more  ease  than  he  could  otherwise ;  and 
sometimes  a  skilfully  rased  piece  of  paper  will,  in  the  midst 


ON  COLOUR  AND  COMPOSITION 


337 


of  transparent  tints,  answer  nearly  the  purpose  of  chalky 
body-colour  in  representing  the  surfaces  of  rocks  or  buildings. 
But  artifices  of  this  kind  are  always  treacherous  in  a  tyro's 
hands,  tempting  him  to  trust  in  them  ;  and  you  had  better 
always  work  on  white  or  grey  paper  as  smooth  as  silk  ;*  and 
never  disturb  the  surface  of  your  colour  or  paper,  except 
finally  to  scratch  out  the  very  highest  lights  if  you  are  using 
transparent  colours. 

I  have  said  above  that  body-colour  drawing  will  teach  you 
the  use  of  colour  better  than  working  with  merely  transparent 
tints  ;  but  this  is  not  because  the  process  is  an  easier  one, 
but  because  it  is  a  more  complete  one,  and  also  because  it  in- 
volves some  working  with  transparent  tints  in  the  best  way. 
You  are  not  to  think  that  because  you  use  body-colour  you 
may  make  any  kind  of  mess  that  you  like,  and  yet  get  out  of 
it.  But  you  are  to  avail  yourself  of  the  characters  of  your 
material,  which  enable  you  most  nearly  to  imitate  the  proc- 
esses of  Nature.  Thus,  suppose  you  have  a  red  rocky  cliff 
to  sketch,  with  blue  clouds  floating  over  it.  You  paint  your 
cliff  first  firmly,  then  take  your  blue,  mixing  it  to  such  a  tint 
(and  here  is  a  great  part  of  the  skill  needed),  that  when  it  is 
laid  over  the  red,  in  the  thickness  required  for  the  effect  of 
the  mist,  the  warm  rock-colour  showing  through  the  blue 
cloud-colour,  may  bring  it  to  exactly  the  hue  you  want ;  (your 
upper  tint,  therefore,  must  be  mixed  colder  than  you  want  it ;) 
then  you  lay  it  on,  varying  it  as  you  strike  it,  getting  the 
forms  of  the  mist  at  once,  and,  if  it  be  rightly  done,  with  ex- 
quisite quality  of  colour,  from  the  warm  tint's  showing 
through  and  between  the  particles  of  the  other.  When  it  is 
dry,  you  may  add  a  little  colour  to  retouch  the  edges  where 
they  want  shape,  or  heighten  the  lights  where  they  want 
roundness,  or  put  another  tone  over  the  whole ;  but  you  can 

*  Bat  not  shiny  or  greasy.  Bristol  board,  or  hot-pressed  imperial,  or 
grey  paper  that  feels  slightly  adhesive  to  the  hand,  is  best.  Coarse, 
gritty,  and  sandy  papers  are  fit  only  for  blotters  and  blunderers ;  no 
good  draughtsman  would  lay  a  line  on  them.  Turner  worked  much  on 
a  thin  tough  paper,  dead  in  surface  ;  rolling  up  his  sketches  in  tight 
bundles  that  would  go  deep  into  his  pockets. 


338 


THE  ELEMENTS  OF  DRA  WING. 


take  none  away.  If  you  touch  or  disturb  the  surface,  or  by 
any  untoward  accident  mix  the  under  and  upper  colours  to- 
gether, all  is  lost  irrecoverably.  Begin  your  drawing  from 
the  ground  again  if  you  like,  or  throw  it  into  the  fire  if  you 
like.    But  do  not  waste  time  in  trying  to  mend  it.* 

This  discussion  of  the  relative  merits  of  transparent  and 
opaque  colour  has,  however,  led  us  a  little  beyond  the  point 
where  we  should  have  begun  ;  we  must  go  back  to  our  palette, 
if  you  please.  Get  a  cake  of  each  of  the  hard  colours  named 
in  the  note  below  f  and  try  experiments  on  their  simple  com- 
binations, by  mixing  each  colour  with  every  other.  If  you 
like  to  do  it  in  an  orderly  way,  you  may  prepare  a  squared 
piece  of  pasteboard,  and  put  the  pure  colours  in  columns  at 

*  I  insist  upon  this  unalterability  of  colour  the  more  because  I  address 
you  as  a  beginner,  or  an  amateur  ;  a  great  artist  can  sometimes  get  out 
of  a  difficulty  with  credit,  or  repent  without  confession.  Yet  even 
Titian's  alterations  usually  show  as  stains  on  his  work. 

f  It  is,  I  think,  a  piece  of  affectation  to  try  to  work  with  few  colours ; 
it  saves  time  to  have  enough  tints  prepared  without  mixing,  and  you 
may  at  once  allow  yourself  these  twenty-four.  If  you  arrange  them 
in  your  colour-box  in  the  order  I  have  set  them  down,  you  will  always 
easily  put  your  finger  on  the  one  you  want. 


Cobalt. 
Black. 

Lemon  yellow. 
Raw  sienna. 
Mars  orange. 
Brown  madder. 


Smalt. 
Gamboge. 
Cadmium  yellow. 
Burnt  sienna. 
Ext' t  of  vermilion. 
Burnt  umber. 


Antwerp  blue. 
Emerald  green. 
Yellow  ochre. 
Light  red 
Carmine. 
Vandyke  brown. 


Prussian  blue. 
Hooker* s  green. 
Roman  ochre. 
Indian  red. 
Violet  carmine. 
Sepia. 


Antwerp  blue  and  Prussian  blue  are  not  very  permanent  colours,  but 
you  need  not  care  much  about  permanence  in  your  own  work  as  yet, 
and  they  are  both  beautiful  ;  while  Indigo  is  marked  by  Field  as  more 
fugitive,  still,  and  is  very  ugly.  Hooker's  green  is  a  mixed  colour,  put 
in  the  box  merely  to  save  you  loss  of  time  in  mixing  gamboge  and 
Prussian  blue.  No.  1.  is  the  best  tint  of  it.  Violet  carmine  is  a  noble 
colour  for  laying  broken  shadows  with,  to  be  worked  into  afterwards 
with  other  colours. 

If  you  wish  to  take  up  colouring  seriously,  you  had  better  get  Field's 
"  Chromatography  "  at  once  ;  only  do  not  attend  to  anything  it  says 
about  principles  or  harmonies  of  colour  ;  but  only  to  its  statements  of 
practical  serviceableness  in  pigments,  and  of  their  operations  on  each 
other  when  mixed,  &c. 


ON  COLOUR  AND  COMPOSITION. 


339 


the  top  find  side  ;  the  mixed  tints  being  given  at  the  inter- 
sections, thus  (the  letters  standing  for  colours  )  : 


b 

c 

d 

e 

f 

a  ab 

ac 

a  d 

ae 

af 

b  - 

be 

bd 

be 

bf 

c  — 

cd 

c  e 

cf 

d  - 

de 

df 

e  — 

ef 

&c. 

This  will  give  you  some  general  notion  of  the  characters  of 
mixed  tints  of  two  colours  only,  and  it  is  better  in  practice 
to  confine  yourself  as  much  as  possible  to  these,  and  to  get 
more  complicated  colours,  either  by  putting  a  third  over  the 
first  blended  tint,  or  by  putting  the  third  into  its  interstices. 
Nothing  but  watchful  practice  will  teach  you  the  effects  that 
colours  have  on  each  other  when  thus  put  over,  or  beside,  each 
other. 

When  you  have  got  a  little  used  to  the  principal  combi- 
nations, place  yourself  at  a  window  which  the  sun  does  not 
shine  in  at,  commanding  some  simple 
piece  of  landscape  ;  outline  this  landscape 
roughly  ;  then  take  a  piece  of  white  card-  ^k<-f 
board,  cut  out  a  hole  in  it  about  the  size  * 
of  a  large  pea  ;  and  supposing  R  is  the  a 
room,  a  d  the  window,  and  you  are  sitting 
at  a,  Fig.  29.,  hold  this  cardboard  a  little 
outside  of  the  window,  upright,  and  in 
the  direction  b  d,  parallel  a  little  turned 
to  the  side  of  the  window,  or  so  as  to  catch  more  light,  as  at 
a  d,  never  turned  as  at  c  d,  or  the  paper  will  be  dark.  Then 
you  will  see  the  landscape,  bit  by  bit,  through  the  circular 
hole.  Match  the  colours  of  each  important  bit  as  nearly 
as  you  can,  mixing  your  tints  with  white,  beside  the  aperture. 
When  matched,  put  a  touch  of  the  same  tint  at  the  top  of 
your  paper,  writing  under  it :  "  dark  tree  colour,"  "  hill  col- 
our," "field  colour,"  as  the  case  may  by.    Then  wash  the  tint 


Fig.  29. 


340 


THE  ELEMENTS  OF  DRAWING. 


away  from  beside  the  opening,  and  the  cardboard  will  be 
ready  to  match  another  piece  of  the  landscape.*  When  you 
have  got  the  colours  of  the  principal  masses  thus  indicated, 
lay  on  a  piece  of  each  in  your  sketch  in  its  right  place,  and 
then  proceed  to  complete  the  sketch  in  harmony  with  them; 
by  your  eye. 

In  the  course  of  your  early  experiments,  you  will  be  much 
struck  by  two  things :  the  first,  the  inimitable  brilliancy  of 
light  in  sky  and  in  sun-lighted  things :  and  the  second,  that 
among  the  tints  which  you  can  imitate,  those  which  you 
thought  the  darkest  will  continually  turn  out  to  be  in  reality 
the  lightest.  Darkness  of  objects  is  estimated  by  us,  under 
ordinary  circumstances,  much  more  by  knowledge  than  by 
sight  ;  thus,  a  cedar  or  Scotch  fir,  at  200  yards  oif,  will  be 
thought  of  darker  green  than  an  elm  or  oak  near  us  ;  because 
we  know  by  experience  that  the  peculiar  colour  they  exhibit, 
at  that  distance,  is  the  sign  of  darkness  of  foliage.  But  when 
we  try  them  through  the  cardboard,  the  near  oak  will  be  found, 
indeed,  rather  dark  green,  and  the  distant  cedar,  perhaps,  pale 
gray-purple.  The  quantity  of  purple  and  grey  in  Nature  is, 
by  the  way,  another  somewhat  surprising  subject  of  dis- 
covery. 

Well,  having  ascertained  thus  your  principal  tints,  you  may 
proceed  to  fill  up  your  sketch  ;  in  doing  which  observe  these 
following  particulars  : 

1.  Many  portions  of  your  subject  appeared  through  the 
aperture  in  the  paper  brighter  than  the  paper,  as  sky,  sun- 
lighted  grass,  &c.  Leave  these  portions,  for  the  present, 
white  ;  and  proceed  with  the  parts  of  which  you  can  match 
the  tints. 

*  A  more  methodical,  though,  under  general  circumstances,  uselessly 
prolix  way,  is  to  cut  a  square  hole,  some  half  an  inch  wide,  in  the  sheet 
of  cardboard,  and  a  series  of  small  circular  holes  in  a  slip  of  cardboard 
an  inch  wide.  Pass  the  slip  over  the  square  opening,  and  match  each 
colour  beside  one  of  the  circular  openings.  You  will  thus  have  no  occa- 
sion to  wash  any  of  the  colours  away.  But  the  first  rough  method  is 
generally  all  you  want,  as  after  a  little  practice,  you  only  need  to  look 
at  the  hue  through  the  opening  in  order  to  be  able  to  transfer  it  to  your 
drawing  at  once. 


ON  COLOUR  AND  COMPOSITION.  341 


2.  As  you  tried  your  subject  with  the  cardboard,  you  must 
have  observed  how  many  changes  of  hue  took  place  over  small 
spaces.  In  filling  up  your  work,  try  to  educate  your  eye  to 
perceive  these  differences  of  hue  without  the  help  of  the  card- 
board, and  lay  them  deliberately,  like  a  mosaic-worker,  as  sep- 
arate colours,  preparing  each  carefully  on  your  palatte,  and 
laying  it  as  if  it  were  a  patch  of  coloured  cloth,  cut  out,  to  be 
fitted  neatly  by  its  edge  to  the  next  patch  ;  so  that  the  fault  of 
your  work  may  be,  not  a  slurred  or  misty  look,  but  a  patched 
bed-cover  look,  as  if  it  had  all  been  cut  out  with  scissors.  For 
instance,  in  drawing  the  trunk  of  a  birch  tree,  there  will  be 
probably  white  high  lights,  then  a  pale  rosy  grey  round  them 
oil  the  light  side,  then  a  (probably  greenish)  deeper  grey  on 
the  dark  side,  varied  by  reflected  colours,  and  over  all,  rich 
black  strips  of  bark  and  brown  spots  of  moss.  Lay  first  the 
rosy  grey,  leaving  white  for  the  high  lights  and  for  the  spots  of 
moss,  and  not  touching  the  dark  side.  Then  lay  the  grey  for 
the  dark  side,*  fitting  it  well  up  to  the  rosy  grey  of  the  light, 
leaving  also  in  this  darker  grey  the  white  paper  in  the  places 
for  the  black  and  brown  moss ;  then  prepare  the  moss  colours 
separately  for  each  spot,  and  lay  each  in  the  white  place  left 
for  it.  Not  one  grain  of  white,  except  that  purposely  left  for 
the  high  lights,  must  be  visible  when  the  work  is  done,  even 
through  a  magnifying-glass,  so  cunningly  must  you  fit  the 
edges  to  each  other.  Finally,  take  your  background  colours, 
and  put  them  on  each  side  of  the  tree-trunk,  fitting  them  care- 
fully to  its  edge. 

Fine  work  you  would  make  of  this,  wouldn't  you,  if  you  had 
not  learned  to  draw  first,  and  could  not  now  draw  a  good  out- 
line for  the  stem,  much  less  terminate  a  colour  mass  in  the 
outline  you  wanted  ? 

Your  work  will  look  very  odd  for  some  time,  when  you  first 
begin  to  paint  in  this  way*  and  before  you  can  modify  it,  as  I 
shall  tell  you  presently  how ;  but  never  mind  ;  it  is  of  the 
greatest  possible  importance  that  you  should  practice  this  sep- 
arate laying  on  of  the  hues,  for  all  good  colouring  finally  de- 
pends on  it.  It  is,  indeed,  often  necessary,  and  sometimes  de* 
sirable,  to  lay  one  colour  and  form  boldly  over  another  :  thus, 


IM2  TIIE  ELEMENTS  OF  JJRA  WING. 

in  laying  leaves  on  blue  sky,  it  is  impossible  always  in  large 
pictures,  or  when  pressed  for  time,  to  till  in  the  blue  through 
the  interstices  of  the  leaves  ;  and  the  great  Venetians  con- 
stantly lay  their  blue  ground  first,  and  then,  having  let  it  dry, 
strike  the  golden  brown  over  it  in  the  form  of  the  leaf,  leaving 
the  under  blue  to  shine  through  the  gold,  and  subdue  it  to  the 
olive  green  they  want.  But  in  the  most  precious  and  perfect 
work  each  leaf  is  inlaid,  and  the  blue  worked  round  it :  and, 
whether  you  use  one  or  other  mode  of  getting  your  result,  it  is 
equally  necessary  to  be  absolute  and  decisive  in  your  laying  the 
colour.  Either  your  ground  must  be  laid  firmly  first,  and  then 
your  upper  colour  struck  upon  it  in  perfect  form,  for  ever, 
thenceforward,  unalterable  ;  or  else  the  two  colours  must  be 
individually  put  in  their  places,  and  led  up  to  each  other  till 
they  meet  at  their  appointed  border,  equally,  thenceforward, 
unchangeable.  Either  process,  you  see,  involves  absolute  de- 
cision. If  you  once  begin  to  slur,  or  change,  or  sketch,  or  try 
this  way  and  that  with  your  colour,  it  is  all  over  with  it  and 
with  you.  You  will  continually  see  bad  copyists  trying  to  imi- 
tate the  Venetians,  by  daubing  their  colours  about,  and  re- 
touching, and  finishing,  and  softening  :  when  every  touch  and 
every  added  hue  only  lead  them  farther  into  chaos.  There  is 
a  dog  between  two  children  in  a  Veronese  in  the  Louvre,  which 
gives  the  copyist  much  employment.  He  has  a  dark  ground 
behind  him,  which  Veronese  has  painted  first,  and  then  when 
it  was  dry,  or  nearly  so,  struck  the  locks  of  the  dog's  white 
hair  over  it  with  some  half-dozen  curling  sweeps  of  his  brush, 
right  at  once,  and  forever.  Had  one  line  or  hair  of  them  gone 
wrong,  it  would  have  been  wrong  forever  ;  no  retouching  could 
linve  mended  it.  The  poor  copyists  daub  in  first  some  back- 
ground, and  then  some  dog's  hair  ;  then  retouch  the  back- 
ground, then  the  hair,  work  for  hours  at  it,  expecting  it  always 
to  come  right  to-morrow — "  when  it  is  finished."  They  may 
work  for  centuries  at  it,  and  they  will  never  do  it.  If  they  can 
do  it  with  Veronese's  allowance  of  work,  half  a  dozen  sweeps 
of  the  hand  over  the  dark  background,  well  ;  if  not,  they  may 
ask  the  dog  himself  whether  it  will  ever  come  right,  and  get 
true  answer  from  him — on  Launce's  conditions  :  "  If  he  say 


ON  COLOUR  AND  COMPOSITION. 


313 


'ay/  it  will ;  if  he  say  'no/  it  will ;  if  he  shake  his  tail  and 
say  nothing,  it  wilL" 

Whenever  you  lay  on  a  mass  of  colour,  be  sure  that  how- 
ever large  it  may  be,  or  however  small,  it  shall  be  gradated. 
No  colour  exists  in  Nature  under  ordinary  circumstances  with- 
out gradation.  If  you  do  not  see  this,  it  is  the  fault  of  your 
inexperience  ;  you  will  see  it  in  due  time,  if  you  practise 
enough.  But  in  general  you  may  see  it  at  once.  In  the  birch 
trunk,  for  instance,  the  rosy  grey  must  be  gradated  by  the 
roundness  of  the  stem  till  it  meets  the  shaded  side  ;  similarly 
the  shaded  side  is  gradated  by  reflected  light.  Accordingly, 
whether  by  adding  water,  or  white  paint,  or  by  unequal  force 
of  touch  (this  you  will  do  at  pleasure,  according  to  the  texture 
you  wish  to  produce),  you  must,  in  every  tint  you  lay  on,  make 
it  a  little  paler  at  one  part  than  another,  and  get  an  even  gra- 
dation between  the  two  depths.  This  is  very  like  laying  down 
a  formal  law  or  recipe  for  you  ;  but  you  will  find  it  is  merely 
the  assertion  of  a  natural  fact.  It  is  not  indeed  physically 
impossible  to  meet  with  an  ungradated  piece  of  colour,  but  it 
is  so  supremely  improbable,  that  you  had  better  get  into  the 
habit  of  asking  yourself  invariably,  when  you  are  going 
to  copy  a  tint, — not  "Is  that  gradated?"  but  "  Which  way  is 
it  gradated  ?  "  and  at  least  in  ninety-nine  out  of  a  hundred  in- 
stances, you  will  be  able  to  answer  decisively  after  a  careful 
glance,  though  the  gradation  may  have  been  so  subtle  that 
you  did  not  see  it  at  first.  And  it  does  not  matter  how  small 
the  touch  of  colour  may  be,  though  not  larger  than  the  smallest 
pin's  head,  if  one  part  of  it  is  not  darker  than  the  rest,  it  is  a 
bad  touch  ;  for  it  is  not  merely  because  the  natural  fact  is  so, 
that  your  colour  should  be  gradated  ;  the  preciousness  and 
pleasantness  of  the  colour  itself  depends  more  on  this  than  on 
any  other  of  its  qualities,  for  gradation  is  to  colours  just  what 
curvature  is  to  lines,  both  being  felt  to  be  beautiful  by  the 
pure  instinct  of  every  human  mind,  and  both,  considered  as 
types,  expressing  the  law  of  gradual  change  and  progress  in 
the  human  soul  itself.  What  the  difference  is  in  mere  beauty 
between  a  gradated  and  ungradated  colour,  may  be  seen  easily 
by  laying  an  even  tint  of  rose-colour  on  paper,  'and  putting  a 


344 


THE  ELEMENTS  OF  DRA  WING. 


rose  leaf  beside  it.  The  victorious  beauty  of  the  rose  as 
compared  with  other  flowers,  depends  wholly  on  the  deli- 
cacy and  buantity  of  its  colour  gradations,  all  other  flowers 
being  either  less  rich  in  gradation,  not  having  so  many  folds 
of  leaf ;  or  less  tender,  being  patched  and  veined  instead  of 
flushed. 

4.  But  observe,  it  is  not  enough  in  general  that  colour 
should  be  gradated  by  being  made  merely  paler  or  darker  at 
one  place  than  another.  Generally  colour  changes  as  it  dimin- 
ishes, and  is  not  merely  darker  at  one  spot,  but  also  purer  at 
one  spot  than  anywhere  else.  It  does  not  in  the  least  follow 
that  the  darkest  spot  should  be  the  purest ;  still  less  so  that  the 
lightest  should  be  the  purest.  Very  often  the  two  gradations 
more  or  less  cross  each  other,  one  passing  in  one  direction 
from  paleness  to  darkness,  another  in  another  direction  from 
purity  to  dullness,  but  there  will  almost  always  be  both  of 
them,  however  reconciled  ;  and  you  must  never  be  satisfied 
with  a  piece  of  colour  until  you  have  got  both  :  that  is  to  say, 
every  piece  of  blue  that  you  lay  on  must  be  quite  blue  only  at 
some  given  spot,  nor  that  a  large  spot ;  and  must  be  gradated 
from  that  into  less  pure  blue — greyish  blue,  or  greenish  blue, 
or  purplish  blue,  over  all  the  rest  of  the  space  it  occupies. 
And  this  you  must  do  in  one  of  three  wrays  :  either,  while  the 
colour  is  wet,  mix  it  with  the  colour  which  is  to  subdue  it, 
adding  gradually  a  little  more  and  a  little  more  ;  or  else,  when 
the  colour  is  quite  dry,  strike  a  gradated  touch  of  another 
colour  over  it,  leaving  only  a  point  of  the  first  tint  visible  :  or 
else,  lay  the  subduing  tints  on  in  small  touches,  as  in  the  ex- 
ercise of  tinting  the  chess-board.  Of  each  of  these  methods 
I  have  something  to  tell  you  separately  :  but  that  is  distinct 
from  the  subject  of  gradation,  which  I  must  not  quit  without 
once  more  pressing  upon  you  the  preeminent  necessity  of  in- 
troducing it  everywhere.  I  have  profound  dislike  of  anything 
like  habit  of  hand,  and  yet,  in  this  one  instance,  I  feel  almost 
tempted  to  encourage  you  to  get  into  a  habit  of  never  touch- 
ing paper  with  colour,  without  securing  a  gradation.  You 
will  not  in  Turner's  largest  oil  pictures,  perhaps  six  or  seven 
feet  long  by  four  or  five  high,  find  one  spot  of  colour  as  large 


ON  COLOUR  AND  COMPOSITION 


345 


as  a  grain  of  wheat  ungraclated  :  and  you  will  find  in  practice, 
that  brilliancy  of  hue,  and  vigour  of  light,  and  even  the  aspect 
of  transparency  in  shade,  are  essentially  dependent  on  fchis 
character  alone  ;  hardness,  coldness,  and  opacity  resulting  far 
more  from  equality  of  colour  than  from  nature  of  colour. 
Give  me  some  mud  off  a  city  crossing,  some  ochre  out  of  a 
gravel  pit,  a  little  whitening,  and  some  coal-dust,  and  I  will 
paint  you  a  luminous  picture,  if  you  give  me  time  to  gradate 
my  mud,  and  subdue  my  dust :  but  though  you  had  the  red 
of  the  ruby,  the  blue  of  the  gentian,  snow  for  the  light,  and 
amber  for  the  gold,  you  cannot  paint  a  luminous  picture,  if 
you  keep  the  masses  of  those  colours  unbroken  in  purity,  and 
unvarying  in  depth. 

5.  Next  note  the  three  processes  by  which  gradation  and 
other  characters  are  to  be  obtained  : 

A.  Mixing  while  the  colour  is  wet. 

You  may  be  confused  by  my  first  telling  you  to  lay  on  the 
hues  in  separate  patches,  and  then  telling  you  to  mix  hues  to- 
gether as  you  lay  them  on :  but  the  separate  masses  are  to  be 
laid,  when  colours  distinctly  oppose  each  other  at  a  given 
limit ;  the  hues  to  be  mixed,  when  they  palpitate  one  through 
the  other,  or  fade  one  into  the  other.  It  is  better  to  err  a  lit- 
tle on  the  distinct  side.  Thus  I  told  you  to  paint  the  dark 
and  light  sides  of  the  birch  trunk  separately,  though  in  reality, 
the  two  tints  change,  as  the  trunk  turns  away  from  the  light, 
gradually  one  into  the  other :  and,  after  being  laid  separately 
on,  will  need  some  farther  touching  to  harmonize  them  :  but 
they  do  so  in  a  very  narrow  space,  marked  distinctly  all  the 
way  up  the  trunk  ;  and  it  is  easier  and  safer,  therefore,  to 
keep  them  separate  at  first.  Whereas  it  often  happens  that 
the  whole  beauty  of  two  colours  will  depend  on  the  one  being 
continued  well  through  the  other,  and  playing  in  the  midst  of 
it :  blue  and  green  often  do  so  in  water  :  blue  and  grey,  or 
purple  and  scarlet,  in  sky  ;  in  hundreds  of  such  instances  the 
most  beautiful  and  truthful  results  ma}'  be  obtained  by  laying 
one  colour  into  the  other  while  wet ;  judging  wisely  how  far 
it  will  spread,  or  blending  it  with  the  brush  in  somewhat 
thicker  consistence  of  wet  body-colour  ;  only  observe,  never 


346 


THE  ELEMENTS  OF  DBA  WING. 


mix  in  this  way  two  mixtures  ;  let  the  colour  you  lay  into  the 
other  be  always  a  simple,  not  a  compound  tint. 
B.  Laying  one  colour  over  another. 

If  you  lay  on  a  solid  touch  of  vermilion,  and,  after  it  is  quite 
dry,  strike  a  little  very  wet  carmine  quickly  over  it,  you  will 
obtain  a  much  more  brilliant  red  than  by  mixing  the  carmine 
and  vermilion.  Similarly,  if  you  lay  a  dark  colour  first,  and 
strike  a  little  blue  or  white  body-colour  lightly  over  it,  you 
will  get  a  more  beautiful  grey  than  by  mixing  the  colour  and 
the  blue  or  white.  In  very  perfect  painting,  artifices  of  this 
kind  are  continually  used  ;  but  I  would  not  have  you  trust 
much  to  them  ;  they  are  apt  to  make  you  think  too  much  of 
quality  of  colour.  I  should  like  you  to  depend  on  little  more 
than  the  dead  colours,  simply  laid  on,  only  observe  always 
this,  that  the  less  colour  you  do  the  work  with,  the  better  it 
will  always  be  :  *  so  that  if  you  have  laid  a  red  colour,  and 
you  want  a  purple  one  above,  do  not  mix  the  purple  on  your 
palette  and  lay  it  on  so  thick  as  to  overpower  the  red,  but  take 
a  little  thin  blue  from  your  palette,  and  lay  it  lightly  over 
the  red,  so  as  to  let  the  red  be  seen  through,  and  thus  pro- 
duce the  required  purple  ;  and  if  you  want  a  green  hue  over 
a  blue  one,  do  not  lay  a  quantity  of  green  on  the  blue,  but  a 
little  yellow,  and  so  on,  always  bringing  the  under  colour  into 
service  as  far  as  you  possibly  can.  If,  however,  the  colour  be- 
neath is  wholly  opposed  to  the  one  you  have  to  lay  on,  as, 
suppose,  if  green  is  to  be  laid  over  scarlet,  you  must  either 
remove  the  required  parts  of  the  under  colour  daintily  first 
with  your  knife,  or  with  water ;  or  else,  lay  solid  white  over 
it  massively,  and  leave  that  to  dry,  and  then  glaze  the  white 
with  the  upper  colour.  This  is  better,  in  general,  than  laying 
the  upper  colour  itself  so  thick  as  to  conquer  the  ground, 
which,  in  fact,  if  it  be  a  transparent  colour,  you  cannot  do. 

*  If  colours  were  twenty  times  as  costly  as  they  are,  we  should  have 
many  more  good  painters.  If  I  were  Chancellor  of  the  Exchequer  I 
would  lay  a  tax  of  twenty  shillings  a  cake  on  all  colours  except  black, 
Prussian  blue,  Vandyke  brown,  and  Chinese  white,  which  I  would  leave 
for  students.  I  don't  say  this  jestingly;  I  believe  such  a  tax  would  do 
more  to  advance  real  art  than  a  great  many  schools  of  design. 


ON  COLOUR  AND  COMPOSITION. 


347 


Thus,  if  you  have  to  strike  warm  boughs  and  leaves  of  trees 
over  blue  sky,  and  they  are  too  intricate  to  have  their  places 
left  for  them  in  laying  the  blue,  it  is  better  to  lay  them  first  in 
solid  white,  and  then  glaze  with  sienna  and  ochre,  than  to  mix 
the  sienna  and  white  ;  though,  of  course,  the  process  is  longer 
and  more  troublesome.  Nevertheless,  if  the  forms  of  touches 
required  are  very  delicate,  the  after  glazing  is  impossible. 
You  must  then  mix  the  warm  colour  thick  at  once,  and  so  use 
it :  and  this  is  often  necessary  for  delicate  grasses,  and  such 
other  fine  threads  of  light  in  foreground  work. 

C.  Breaking  one  colour  in  small  points  through  or  over  an- 
other. 

This  is  the  most  important  of  all  processes  in  good  modern* 
oil  and  water-colour  painting,  but  you  need  not  hope  to  attain 
very  great  skill  in  it.  To  do  it  well  is  very  laborious,  and  re- 
quires such  skill  and  delicacy  of  hand  as  can  only  be  acquired 
by  unceasing  practice.  But  you  will  find  advantage  in  noting 
the  following  points : 

(a.)  In  distant  effects  of  rich  subjects,  wood,  or  rippled 
water,  or  broken  clouds,  much  may  be  done  by  touches  or 
crumbling  dashes  of  rather  dry  colour,  with  other  colours  after- 
wards put  cunningly  into  the  interstices.  The  more  you  prac- 
tise this,  when  the  subject  evidently  calls  for  it,  the  more  your 
eye  will  enjoy  the  higher  qualities  of  colour.  The  process  is, 
in  fact,  the  carrying  out  of  the  principle  of  separate  colours 
to  the  utmost  possible  refinement ;  using  atoms  of  colour  in 
juxtaposition,  instead  of  large  spaces.  And  note,  in  filling  up 
minute  interstices  of  this  kind,  that  if  you  want  the  colour 
you  fill  them  with  to  show  brightly,  it  is  better  to  put  a  rather 
positive  point  of  it,  with  a  little  white  left  beside  or  round  it 
in  the  interstice,  than  to  put  a  pale  tint  of  the  colour  over  the 
whole  interstice.  Yellow  or  orange  will  hardly  show,  if  pale, 
in  small  spaces  ;  but  they  show  brightly  in  firm  touches,  how- 
ever small,  with  white  beside  them. 

(6.)  If  a  colour  is  to  be  darkened  by  superimposed  portions 

*  I  say  modern,  because  Titian's  quiet  way  of  blending  colours,  which 
is  the  perfectly  right  one.  is  not  understood  now  by  any  artist.  The  besb 
colour  we  reach  is  got  by  stippling  ;  but  this  not  quite  right. 


348 


THE  ELEMENTS  OF  DBA  WING. 


of  another,  it  is,  in  many  cases,  better  to  lay  the  uppermost 
colour  in  rather  vigorous  small  touches,  like  finely  chopped 
straw,  over  the  under  one,  than  to  lay  it  on  as  a  tint,  for  two 
reasons  :  the  first,  that  the  play  of  the  two  colours  together  is 
pleasant  to  the  eye  ;  the  second,  that  much  expression  of  form 
may  be  got  by  wise  administration  of  the  upper  dark  touches. 
In  distant  mountains  they  may  be  made  pines  of,  or  broken 
crags,  or  villages,  or  stones,  or  whatever  you  choose  ;  in  clouds 
they  may  indicate  the  direction  of  the  rain,  the  roll  and  out- 
line of  the  cloud  masses ;  and  in  water,  the  minor  weaves.  All 
noble  effects  of  dark  atmosphere  are  got  in  good  water-colour 
drawing  by  these  two  expedients,  interlacing  the  colours,  or 
retouching  the  lower  one  with  fine  darker  drawing  in  an 
upper.  Sponging  and  washing  for  dark  atmospheric  effect  is 
barbarous,  and  mere  tyro's  work,  though  it  is  often  useful  for 
passages  of  delicate  atmospheric  light. 

(<?.)  When  you  have  time,  practice  the  production  of  mixed 
tints  by  interlaced  touches  of  the  pure  colours  out  of  which 
they  are  formed,  and  use  the  process  at  the  parts  of  your 
sketches  where  you  wish  to  get  rich  and  luscious  effects.  Study 
the  works  of  William  Hunt,  of  the  Old  Water-colour  Society, 
in  this  respect,  continually,  and  make  frequent  memoranda 
of  the  variegations  in  flowers ;  not  painting  the  flower  com- 
pletely, but  laying  the  ground  colour  of  one  petal,  and  paint- 
ing the  spots  on  it  with  studious  precision  :  a  series  of  single 
petals  of  lilies,  geraniums,  tulips,  &c,  numbered  with  proper 
reference  to  their  position  in  the  flower,  will  be  interesting  to 
tyou  on  many  grounds  besides  those  of  art.  Be  careful  to  get  the 
gradated  distribution  of  the  spots  well  followed  in  the  calceo- 
larias, foxgloves,  and  the  like;  and  work  out  the  odd,  indefinite 
hues  of  the  spots  themselves  with  minute  grains  of  pure  inter- 
kced  colour,  otherwise  you  will  never  get  their  richness  or 
bloom.  You  will  be  surprised  to  find,  as  you  do  this,  first 
the  universality  of  the  law  of  gradation  we  have  so  much  in- 
sisted upon  ;  secondly,  that  Nature  is  just  as  economical  of 
her  fine  colours  as  I  have  told  you  to  be  of  yours.  You  wrould 
think,  by  the  way  she  paints,  that  her  colours  cost  her  some- 
thing enormous :  she  will  only  give  you  a  single  pure  touch} 


ON  COLOUR  AND  COMPOSITION. 


349 


just  where  the  petal  turns  into  light ;  but  down  in  the  bell  all 
\s  subdued,  and  under  the  petal  all  is  subdued,  even  in  the 
showiest  flower.  What  you  thought  was  bright  blue  is,  when 
you  look  close,  only  dusty  grey,  or  green,  or  purple,  or  every 
colour  in  the  world  at  once,  only  a  single  gleam  or  streak  of 
pure  blue  in  the  centre  of  it.  And  so  with  all  her  colours. 
Sometimes  I  have  really  thought  her  miserliness  intolerable  : 
in  a  gentian,  for  instance,  the  way  she  economises  her  ultra- 
marine down  in  the  bell  is  a  little  too  bad. 

Next,  respecting  general  tone.  I  said,  just  now,  that,  for 
the  sake  of  students,  my  tax  should  not  be  laid  on  black  or 
on  white  pigments ;  but  if  you  mean  to  be  a  colourist,  you 
must  lay  a  tax  on  them  yourselves  wThen  you  begin  to  use  true 
colour ;  that  is  to  say,  you  must  use  them  little  and  make  of 
them  much.  There  is  no  better  test  of  your  colour  tones  be- 
ing good,  than  your  having  made  the  white  in  your  picture 
precious,  and  the  black  conspicuous. 

I  say,  first,  the  white  precious.  I  do  not  mean  merely  glit- 
tering or  brilliant ;  it  is  easy  to  scratch  white  seagulls  out  of 
black  clouds  and  dot  clumsy  foliage  with  chalky  dew  ;  but, 
when  white  is  well  managed,  it  ought  to  be  strangely  deli- 
cious— tender  as  well  as  bright — like  inlaid  mother  of  pearl,  or 
white  roses  wTashed  in  milk.  The  eye  ought  to  seek  it  for 
rest,  brilliant  though  it  may  be  ;  and  to  feel  it  as  a  space  of 
strange,  heavenly  paleness  in  the  midst  of  the  flushing  of  the 
colours.  This  effect  you  can  only  reach  by  general  depth  of 
middle  tint,  by  absolutely  refusing  to  allow  any  white  to  exist 
except  where  you  need  it,  and  by  keeping  the  white  itself  sub- 
dued by  grey,  except  at  a  few  points  of  chief  lustre. 

Secondly,  you  must  make  the  black  conspicuous.  How- 
ever small  a  point  of  black  may  be,  it  ought  to  catch  the  eye, 
otherwise  your  work  is  too  heavy  in  the  shadow.  All  the  or- 
dinary shadows  should  be  of  some  colour — never  black,  nor 
approaching  black,  they  should  be  evidently  and  always  of  a 
luminous  nature,  and  the  black  should  look  strange  among 
them  ;  never  occurring  except  in  a  black  object,  or  in  small 
points  indicative  of  intense  shade  in  the  very  centre  of  masses 
of  shadow.    Shadows  of  absolutely  negative  grey,  however, 


350 


THE  ELEMENTS  OF  DRA  WING. 


may  be  beautifully  used  with  white,  or  with  gold  ;  but  still 
though  the  black  thus,  in  subdued  strength,  becomes  spa* 
cious,  it  should  always  be  conspicuous  ;  the  spectator  should 
notice  this  grey  neutrality  with  some  wonder,  and  enjoy,  all 
the  more  intensely  on  account  of  it,  the  gold  colour  and 
the  white  which  it  relieves.  Of  all  the  great  colourists 
Velasquez  is  the  greatest  master  of  the  black  chords.  His 
black  is  more  precious  than  most  other  people's  crimson. 

It  is  not,  however,  only  white  and  black  which  you  must 
make  valuable  ;  you  must  give  rare  worth  to  every  colour  you 
use  ;  but  the  white  and  black  ought  to  separate  themselves 
quaintly  from  the  rest,  while  the  other  colours  should  be  con- 
tinually passing  one  into  the  other,  being  all  evidently  com- 
panions in  the  same  gay  world  ;  while  the  white,  black,  and 
neutral  grey  should  stand  monkishly  aloof  in  the  midst  of 
them.  You  may  melt  your  crimson  into  purple,  your  purple 
into  blue  and  your  blue  into  green,  but  you  must  not  melt  any 
of  them  into  black.  You  should,  however,  try,  as  I  said,  to 
give  preciousness  to  all  your  colours ;  and  this  especially  by 
never  using  a  grain  more  than  will  just  do  the  work,  and 
giving  each  hue  the  highest  value  by  opposition.  All  fine 
colouring,  like  fine  drawing,  is  delicate ;  and  so  delicate  that 
if,  at  last,  you  see  the  colour  you  are  putting  on,  you  are  put- 
ting on  too  much.  You  ought  to  feel  a  change  wrought  in 
the  general  tone,  by  touches  of  colour  which  individually  are 
too  pale  to  be  seen  ;  and  if  there  is  one  "atom  of  any  colour  in 
the  whole  picture  which  is  unnecessary  to  it,  that  atom  hurts 
it. 

Notice  also,  that  nearly  all  good  compound  colours  are  odd 
colours.  You  shall  look  at  a  hue  in  a  good  painter's  work  ten 
minutes  before  you  know  what  to  call  it.  You  thought  it  was 
brown,  presently,  you  feel  that  it  is  red  ;  next  that  there  is, 
somehow,  yellow  in  it ;  presently  af  terwards  that  there  is  blue 
in  it.  If  you  try  to  copy  it  you  will  always  find  your  colour 
too  warm  or  too  cold — no  colour  in  the  box  will  seem  to  have 
any  affinity  with  it  ;  and  yet  it  will  be  as  pure  as  if  it  were 
laid  at  a  single  touch  with  a  single  colour. 

As  to  the  choice  and  harmony  of  colours  in  general,  if  you 


ON  COLOUR  AND  COMPOSITION.  351 


cannot  choose  and  harmonize  them  by  instinct,  you*  will  never 
do  it  at  all.  If  you  need  examples  of  utterly  harsh  and  horri- 
ble colour,  you  may  find  plenty  given  in  treatises  upon  colour- 
ing, to  illustrate  the  laws  of  harmony  ;  and  if  you  want  to 
colour  beautifully,  colour  as  best  pleases  yourself  at  quiet 
times,  not  so  as  to  catch  the  eye,  nor  to  look  as  if  it  were 
clever  or  difficult  to  colour  in  that  way,  but  so  that  the  colour 
may  be  pleasant  to  you  when  you  are  happy,  or  thoughtful. 
Look  much  at  the  morning  and  evening  sky,  and  much  at 
simple  flowers — dog-roses,  wood  hyacinths,  violets,  poppies, 
thistles,  heather,  and  such  like — as  Nature  arranges  them  in 
the  woods  and  fields.  If  ever  any  scientific  person  tells  you 
that  two  colours  are  "  discordant,"  make  a  note  of  the  two 
colours,  and  put  them  together  whenever  you  can.  I  have 
actually  heard  people  say  that  blue  and  green  were  discord- 
ant ;  the  two  colours  which  Nature  seems  to  intend  never  to  be 
separated  and  never  to  be  felt,  either  of  them,  in  its  full  beauty 
without  the  other  ! — a  peacock's  neck,  or  a  blue  sky  through 
green  leaves,  or  a  blue  wave  with  green  lights  though  it,  being 
precisely  the  loveliest  things,  next  to  clouds  at  sunrise,  in  this 
coloured  world  of  ours.  If  you  have  a  good  eye  for  colours,  you 
will  soon  find  out  how  constantly  Nature  puts  purple  and  green 
together,  purple  and  scarlet,  green  and  blue,  yellow  and  neu- 
tral grey,  and  the  like  ;  and  how  she  strikes  these  colour-con- 
cords for  general  tones,  and  then  works  into  them  with  innu- 
merable subordinate  ones  ;  and  you  will  gradually  come  to 
like  what  she  does,  and  find  out  new  and  beautiful  chords  of 
colour  in  her  work  every  day.  If  you  enjoy  them,  depend 
upon  it  you  will  paint  them  to  a  certain  point  right :  or,  at 
least,  if  you  do  not  enjoy  them,  you  are  certain  to  paint  them 
wrong.  If  colour  does  not  give  you  intense  pleasure,  let  it 
alone  ;  depend  upon  it,  you  are  only  tormenting  the  eyes  and 
senses  of  people  who  feel  colour,  whenever  you  touch  it ;  and 
that  is  unkind  and  improper.  You  will  find,  also,  your  power 
of  colouring  depend  much  on  your  state  of  health  and  right 
balance  of  mind  ;  when  you  are  fatigued  or  ill  you  will  not 
see  colours  well,  and  when  you  are  ill-tempered  you  will  not 
choose  them  well  :  thus,  though  not  infallibly  a  test  of  char- 


352 


THE  ELEMENTS  OF  DRA  WING. 


acter  in  individuals,  colour  power  is  a  great  sign  of  mental 
health  in  nations  ;  when  they  are  in  a  state  of  intellectual  de- 
cline, their  colouring  always  gets  dull.*  You  must  also  take 
great  care  not  to  be  misled  by  affected  talk  about  colour  from 
people  who  have  not  the  gift  of  it :  numbers  are  eager  and 
voluble  about  it  who  probably  never  in  all  their  lives  received 
one  genuine  colour-sensation.  The  modern  religionists  of  the 
school  of  Overbeck  are  just  like  people  who  eat  slate-pencil 
and  chalk,  and  assure  everybody  that  they  are  nicer  and  purer 
than  strawberries  and  plums. 

Take  care  also  never  to  be  misled  into  any  idea  that  colour 
can  help  or  display  form  ;  colour  f  always  disguises  form, 
and  is  meant  to  do  so. 

It  is  a  favourite  dogma  among  modern  writers  on  colour 
that  " warm  colours  99  (reds  and  yellows)  "approach"  or  ex- 
press nearness,  and  "  cold  colours  "  (blue  and  grey)  "  retire  " 
or  express  distance.  So  far  is  this  from  being  the  case,  that 
no  expression  of  distance  in  the  world  is  so  great  as  that  of 
the  gold  and  orange  in  twilight  sky.  Colours,  as  such,  are 
absolutely  inexpressive  respecting  distance.  It  is  their  quality 
(as  depth,  delicacy,  &c.)  which  expresses  distance,  not  their 

*  The  worst  general  character  that  colour  can  possibly  have  is  a  prev- 
alent tendency  to  a  dirty  yellowish  green,  like  that  of  a  decaying  heap 
of  vegetables  ;  this  colour  is  accurately  indicative  of  decline  or  paralysis 
in  missal-painting. 

f  That  is  to  say,  local  colour  inherent  in  the  object.  The  gradations 
of  colour  in  the  various  shadows  belonging  to  various  lights  exhibit  form, 
and  therefore  no  one  but  a  colourist  can  ever  draw  forms  perfectly  (see 
"  Modern  Painters/'  vol.  iv.  chap.  iii.  at  the  end)  ;  but  all  notions  of  ex- 
plaining form  by  superimposed  colour,  as  in  architectural  mouldings^ 
are  absurd.  Colour  adorns  form,  but  does  not  interpret  it.  An  apple  i? 
prettier,  because  it  is  striped,  but  it  does  not  look  a  bit  rounder  ;  and  a 
cheek  is  prettier  because  it  is  flushed,  but  you  would  see  the  form  of  the 
cheek  bone  better  if  it  were  not.  Colour  may,  indeed,  detach  one  shape 
from  another,  as  in  grounding  a  bas-relief,  but  it  always  diminishes* 
the  appearance  of  projection,  and  whether  you  put  blue,  purple,  red, 
yellow,  or  green,  for  your  ground,  the  bas-relief  will  be  just  as  clearly 
or  just  as  imperfectly  relieved,  as  long  as  the  colours  are  of  equal  depth 
The  blue  ground  will  not  retire  the  hundredth  part  of  an  inch  more 
than  the  red  one. 


vN  COLOUR  AND  COMPOSITION. 


353 


tint.  A  blue  bandbox  set  on  the  same  shelf  with  a  yellow  one 
will  not  look  an  inch  farther  off,  but  a  red  or  orange  cloud,  in 
the  upper  sky,  will  always  appear  to  be  beyond  a  blue  cloud 
close  to  us,  as  it  is  in  reality.  It  is  quite  true  that  in  certain 
objects,  blue  is  a  sign  of  distance  ;  but  that  is  not  because 
blue  is  a  retiring  colour,  but  because  the  mist  in  the  air  is 
blue,  and  therefore  any  warm  colour  which  has  not  strength 
of  light  enough  to  pierce  the  mist  is  lost  or  subdued  in  its 
blue  :  but  blue  is  no  more,  on  this  account,  a  "  retiring  col- 
our," than  brown  is  a  retiring  colour,  because,  when  stones 
are  seen  through  brown  water,  the  deeper  they  lie  the  browner 
they  look  ;  or  than  yellow  is  a  retiring  colour,  because  when 
objects  are  seen  through  a  London  fog,  the  farther  off  they 
are  the  yellower  they  look.  Neither  blue,  nor  yellow,  nor  red, 
can  have,  as  such,  the  smallest  power  of  expressing  either  near- 
ness or  distance  :  they  express  them  only  under  the  peculiar 
circumstances  which  render  them  at  the  moment,  or  in  that 
place,  signs  of  nearness  or  distance.  Thus,  vivid  orange  in  an 
orange  is  a  sign  of  nearness,  for  if  you  put  the  orange  a  great 
way  off,  its  colour  will  not  look  so  bright  ;  but  vivid  orange 
in  sky  is  a  sign  of  distance,  because  you  cannot  get  the  colour 
of  orange  in  a  cloud  near  you.  So  purple  in  a  violet  or  a 
hyacinth  is  a  sign  of  nearness,  because  the  closer  you  ]ook  at 
them  the  more  purple  you  see.  But  purple  in  a  mountain  i3 
a  sign  of  distance,  because  a  mountain  close  to  you  is  not 
purple,  but  green  or  grey.  It  may,  indeed,  be  generally  as- 
sumed that  a  tender  or  pale  colour  will  more  or  less  express 
distance,  and  a  powerful  or  dark  colour  nearness  ;  but  even 
this  is  not  always  so.  Heathery  hills  will  usually  give  a  pale 
and  tender  purple  near,  and  an  intense  and  dark  purple  far 
away  ;  the  rose  colour  of  sunset  on  snow  is  pale  on  the  snow 
at  your  feet,  deep  and  full  on  the  snow  in  the  distance  ;  and 
the  green  of  a  Swiss  lake  is  pale  in  the  clear  waves  on  the 
beach,  but  intense  as  an  emerald  in  the  sunstreak,  six  miles 
from  shore.  And  in  any  case,  when  the  foreground  is  in  strong 
light,  with  much  water  about  it,  or  white  surface,  casting  in- 
tense reflections,  all  its  colours  may  be  perfectly  delicate,  pale, 
and  faint ;  while  the  distance,  when  it  is  in  shadow,  may  re- 


354 


THE  ELEMENTS  OF  DRAWING. 


lieve  the  whole  foreground  with  intense  darks  of  purple,  blue 
green,  or  ultramarine  blue.  So  that,  on  the  whole,  it  is  quite 
hopeless  and  absurd  to  expect  any  help  from  laws  of  "  aerial 
perspective."  Look  for  the  natural  effects,  and  set  them  down 
as  fully  as  you  can,  and  as  faithfully,  and  never  alter  a  colour 
because  it  won't  look  in  its  right  place.  Put  the  colour 
strong,  if  it  be  strong,  though  far  off ;  faint,  if  it  be  faint, 
though  close  to  you.  Why  should  you  suppose  that  Nature 
always  means  you  to  know  exactly  how  far  one  thing  is  from 
another  ?  She  certainly  intends  you  always  to  enjoy  her  col- 
ouring, but  she  does  not  wish  you  always  to  measure  her 
space.  You  would  be  hard  put  to  it,  every  time  you  painted 
the  sun  setting,  if  you  had  to  express  his  95,000,000  miles  of 
distance  in  "  aerial  perspective." 

There  is,  however,  I  think,  one  law  about  distance,  which 
has  some  claims  to  be  considered  a  constant  one  :  namely, 
that  dullness  and  heaviness  of  colour  are  more  or  less  indica- 
tive of  nearness.  All  distant  colour  is  pure  colour :  it  may 
not  be  bright,  but  it  is  clear  and  lovely,  not  opaque  nor  soiled  ; 
for  the  air  and  light  coming  between  us  and  any  earthy 
or  imperfect  colour,  purify  or  harmonise  it ;  hence  a  bad 
colourist  is  peculiarly  incapable  of  expressing  distance.  I  do 
not  of  course  mean  that  you  are  to  use  bad  colours  in  your 
foreground  by  way  of  making  it  come  forward  ;  but  only  that 
a  failure  in  colour,  there,  will  not  put  it  out  of  its  place  ; 
while  a  failure  in  colour  in  the  distance  will  at  once  do  away 
with  its  remoteness  :  your  dull-coloured  foreground  will  still 
be  a  foreground,  though  ill-painted  ;  but  your  ill-painted 
distance  will  not  be  merely  a  dull  distance, — it  will  be  no 
distance  at  all. 

I  have  only  one  thing  more  to  advise  you,  namely,  never  to 
colour  petulantly  or  hurriedly.  You  will  not,  indeed,  be  able, 
if  you  attend  properly  to  your  colouring,  to  get  anything  like 
the  quantity  of  form  you  could  in  a  chiaroscuro  sketch  ;  never- 
theless, if  you  do  not  dash  or  rush  at  your  work,  nor  do  it 
lazily,  you  may  always  get  enough  form  to  be  satisfactory.  An 
extra  quarter  of  an  hour,  distributed  in  quietness  over  the 
course  of  the  whole  study,  may  just  make  the  difference 


ON  COLOUR  AND  COMPOSITION. 


355 


between  a  quite  intelligible  drawing,  and  a  slovenly  and 
obscure  one.  If  you  determine  well  beforehand  what  outline 
each  piece  of  colour  is  to  have  ;  and,  when  it  is  on  the  paper, 
guide  it  without  nervousness,  as  far  as  you  can,  into  the  form 
required  ;  and  then,  after  it  is  dry,  consider  thoroughly  what 
touches  are  needed  to  complete  it,  before  laying  one  of  them 
on  ;  you  will  be  surprised  to  find  how  masterly  the  work  will 
soon  look,  as  compared  with  a  hurried  or  ill-considered  sketch. 
In  no  process  that  I  know  of — least  of  all  in  sketching — can 
time  be  really  gained  by  precipitation.  It  is  gained  only  by 
caution ;  and  gained  in  all  sorts  of  ways  :  for  not  only  truth 
of  form,  but  force  of  light,  is  always  added  by  an  intelligent 
and  shapely  laying  of  the  shadow  colours.  You  may  often 
make  a  simple  flat  tint,  rightly  gradated  and  edged,  express  a 
complicated  piece  of  subject  without  a  single  retouch.  The 
two  Swiss  cottages,  for  instance,  with  their  balconies,  and 
glittering  windows,  and  general  character  of  shingly  eaves,  are 
expressed  in  Fig.  30.,  with 
one  tint  of  grey,  and  a 
few  dispersed  spots  and 
lines  of  it ;  all  of  which 
you  ought  to  be  able  to 
lay  on  without  more  than 
thrice  dipping  your 
brush,  and  without  a 
single  touch  after  the : 
tint  is  dry. 

Here,  then,  for  I  cannot 
without  coloured  illustra- 
tions tell  you  more,  I  must  leave  you  to  follow  out  the  subject 
for  yourself,  with  such  help  as  }Tou  may  receive  from  the  water- 
colour  drawings  accessible  to  you  ;  or  from  any  of  the  little 
treatises  on  their  art  which  have  been  published  lately  by  our 
water-colour  painters.*  But  do  not  trust  much  to  works  of  this 
kind.    You  may  get  valuable  hints  from  them  as  to  mixture 

*  See,  however,  at  the  close  of  this  letter,  the  notice  of  one  more  point 
connected  with  the  management  of  colour,  under  the  head  "  Law  of 
Harmony.7' 


Fig.  30. 


356 


THE  ELEMENTS  OF  DRAWING. 


of  colours  ;  and  here  and  there  you  will  find  a  useful  artifice 
or  process  explained  ;  but  nearly  all  such  books  are  written 
only  to  help  idle  amateurs  to  a  meretricious  skill,  and  they 
are  full  of  precepts  and  principles  which  may,  for  the  most 
part,  be  interpreted  by  their  precise  negatives,  and  then  acted 
upon  with  advantage.  Most  of  them  praise  boldness,  when 
the  only  safe  attendant  spirit  of  a  beginner  is  caution  ; — 
advise  velocity,  when  the  first  condition  of  success  is  delibera- 
tion ; — and  plead  for  generalisation,  when  all  the  foundations 
of  power  must  be  laid  in  knowledge  of  specialty. 

And  now,  in  the  last  place,  I  have  a  few  things  to  tell  you 
respecting  that  dangerous  nobleness  of  consummate  art, — Com- 
position. For  though  it  is  quite  unnecessary  for  you  yet 
awhile  to  attempt  it,  and  it  may  be  inexpedient  for  you  to  at- 
tempt it  at  all,  you  ought  to  know  what  it  means,  and  to  look 
for  and  enjoy  it  in  the  art  of  others. 

Composition  means,  literally  and  simply,  putting  several 
things  together,  so  as  to  make  one  thing  out  of  them  ;  the 
nature  and  goodness  of  which  they  all  have  a  share  in  produc- 
ing. Thus  a  musician  composes  an  air,  by  putting  notes  to- 
gether in  certain  relations  ;  a  poet  composes  a  poem,  by  put- 
ting thoughts  and  words  in  pleasant  order ;  and  a  painter  a 
picture,  by  putting  thoughts,  forms,  and  colours  in  pleasant 
order. 

In  all  these  cases,  observe,  an  intended  unity  must  be  the 
result  of  composition.  A  paviour  cannot  be  said  to  compose 
the  heap  of  stones  which  he  empties  from  his  cart,  nor  the 
sower  the  handful  of  seed  which  he  scatters  from  his  hand. 
It  is  the  essence  of  composition  that  everything  should  be  in 
a  determined  place,  perform  an  intended  part,  and  act,  in 
that  part,  advantageously  for  everything  that  is  connected 
with  it. 

Composition,  understood  in  this  pure  sense,  is  the  type,  in 
the  arts  of  mankind,  of  the  Providential  government  of  the 
world.*  It  is  an  exhibition,  in  the  order  given  to  notes,  or 
colours,  or  forms,  of  the  advantage  of  perfect  fellowship,  dis- 

*  See  farther,  on  this  subject,  u  Modern  Painters,5'  vol.  iv.  chap,  viii 
§6- 


ON  COLOUR  AND  COMPOSITION 


357 


cipline,  and  contentment.  In  a  well-composed  air,  no  note* 
however  short  or  low,  can  be  spared,  but  the  least  is  as  neces- 
sary as  the  greatest  :  no  note,  however  prolonged,  is  tedious ; 
but  the  others  prepare  for,  and  are  benefited  by,  its  duration  : 
no  note,  however  high,  is  tyrannous  ;  the  others  prepare  for 
and  are  benefited  by,  its  exaltation  :  no  note,  however  low,  is 
overpowered,  the  others  prepare  for,  and  sympathise  with,  its 
humility  :  and  the  result  is,  that  each  and  every  note  has  a 
value  in  the  position  assigned  to  it,  which  by  itself,  it  never 
possessed,  and  of  which  by  separation  from  the  others,  it 
would  instantly  be  deprived. 

Similarly,  in  a  good  poem,  each  word  and  thought  enhances 
the  value  of  those  which  precede  and  follow  it ;  and  every  syl- 
lable has  a  loveliness  which  depends  not  so  much  on  its  ab- 
stract sound  as  on  its  position.  Look  at  the  same  word  in  a 
dictionary,  and  you  will  hardly  recognise  it. 

Much  more  in  a  great  picture  ;  every  line  and  colour  is  so 
arranged  as  to  advantage  the  rest.  None  are  inessential, 
however  slight  ;  and  none  are  independent,  however  forcible. 
It  is  not  enough  that  they  truly  represent  natural  objects  ;  but 
they  must  fit  into  certain  places,  and  gather  into  certain  har- 
monious groups  :  so  that,  for  instance,  the  red  chimney  of  a 
cottage  is  not  merely  set  in  its  place  as  a  chimney,  but  that  it 
may  affect,  in  a  certain  way  pleasurable  to  the  eye,  the  pieces 
of  green  or  blue  in  other  parts  of  the  picture  ;  and  we  ought 
to  see  that  the  work  is  masterly,  merely  by  the  positions  and 
quantities  of  these  patches  of  green,  red,  and  blue,  even  at  a 
distance  which  renders  it  perfectly  impossible  to  determine 
what  the  colours  represent  :  or  to  see  whether  the  red  is  a 
chimney,  or  an  old  woman's  cloak  ;  and  whether  the  blue  is 
smoke,  sky,  or  water. 

It  seems  to  be  appointed,  in  order  to  remind  us,  in  all  we 
do,  of  the  great  laws  of  Divine  government  and  human  polity, 
that  composition  in  the  arts  should  strongly  affect  every  order 
of  mind,  however  unlearned  or  thoughtless.  Hence  the  pop- 
ular delight  in  rhythm  and  metre,  and  in  simple  musical 
melodies.  But  it  is  also  appointed  that  power  of  composition 
in  the  fine  arts  should  be  an  exclusive  attribute  of  great  intellect 


358 


THE  ELEMENTS  OF  DRAWING. 


All  men  can  more  or  less  copy  what  they  see,  and,  more  or. 
less,  remember  it  :  powers  of  reflection  and  investigation  are 
also  common  to  us  all,  so  that  the  decision  of  inferiority  in 
these  rests  only  on  questions  of  degree.  A.  has  a  better  mem- 
ory than  B.,  and  C.  reflects  more  profoundly  than  D.  But 
the  gift  of  composition  is  not  given  at  all  to  more  than  one 
man  in  a  thousand  ;  in  its  highest  range,  it  does  not  occur 
above  three  or  four  times  in  a  century. 

It  follows,  from  these  general  truths,  that  it  is  impossible  to 
give  rules  which  will  enable  you  to  compose.  You  might 
much  more  easily  receive  rules  to  enable  you  to  be  witty.  If 
it  were  possible  to  be  witty  by  rule,  wit  would  cease  to  be 
either  admirable  or  amusing  :  if  it  were  possible  to  compose 
melody  by  rule,  Mozart  and  Cimarosa  need  not  have  been 
born  :  if  it  were  possible  to  compose  pictures  by  rule,  Titian 
and  Veronese  would  be  ordinary  men.  The  essence  of  com- 
position lies  precisely  in  the  fact  of  its  being  unteachable,  in 
its  being  the  operation  of  an  individual  mind  of  range  and 
power  exalted  above  others. 

But  though  no  one  can  invent  by  rule,  there  are  some  sim- 
pie  laws  of  arrangement  which  it  is  well  for  you  to  know,  be- 
cause, though  they  will  not  enable  you  to  produce  a  good  pict- 
ure, they  will  often  assist  you  to  set  forth  what  goodness  may 
be  in  your  work  in  a  more  telling  way  than  you  could  have 
done  otherwise  ;  and  by  tracing  them  in  the  work  of  good 
composers,  you  may  better  understand  the  grasp  of  their 
imagination,  and  the  power  it  possesses  over  their  materials. 
I  shall  briefly  state  the  chief  of  these  laws. 

1.  THE  LAW  OF  PRINCIPALITY. 

The  great  object  of  composition  being  always  to  secure 
unity  ;  that  is,  to  make  out  of  many  things  one  whole  ;  the 
first  mode  in  which  this  can  be  effected  is,  by  determining 
that  one  feature  shall  be  more  important  than  all  the  rest,  and 
that  the  others  shall  group  with  it  in  subordinate  positions. 

This  is  the  simplest  law  of  ordinary  ornamentation.  Thus 
the  group  of  two  leaves,  a,  Fig.  31.,  is  unsatisfactory,  because 
it  has  no  leading  leaf  ;  but  that  at  b  fs  prettier,  because  it  has 


ON  COLOUR  AND  COMPOSITION  359 


i 


a  bead  or  master  leaf ;  and  c  more  satisfactory  still,  because 
the  subordination  of  the  other  members  to  this  head  leaf  is 
made  more  manifest  by  their 
gradual  loss  of  size  as  they  fall 
back  from  it.  Hence  part  of 
the  pleasure  we  have  in  the 
Greek  honeysuckle  ornament, 
and  such  others. 

Thus,  also,  good  pictures  have  always  one  light  larger  or 
brighter  than  the  other  lights,  or  one  figure  more  prominent 
than  the  other  figures,  or  one  mass  of  colour  dominant  over  all 
the  other  masses  ;  and  in  general  you  will  find  it  much  bene- 
fit your  sketch  if  you  manage  that  there  shall  be  one  light  on 
the  cottage  wall,  or  one  blue  cloud  in  the  sky,  which  may  attract 
the  eye  as  leading  light,  or  leading  gloom,  above  all  others. 
But  the  observance  of  the  rule  is  often  so  cunningly  concealed 
by  the  great  composers,  that  its  force  is  hardly  at  first  trace- 
able ;  and  you  will  generally  find  that  they  are  vulgar  pictures 
in  which  the  law  is  strikingly  manifest.  This  may  be  simply 
illustrated  by  musical  melody  ;  for  instance,  in  such  phrases 
as  this  : 


one  note  (here  the  upper  g)  rules  the  whole  passage,  and  has 
the  full  energy  of  it  concentrated  in  itself.  Such  passages, 
corresponding  to  completely  subordinated  compositions  in 
painting,  are  apt  to  be  wearisome  if  often  repeated.  But  in 
such  a  phrase  as  this  : 


3e 


iii  n  1 1  j  & 


it  is  very  difficult  to  say,  which  is  the  principal  note.  The  a 
in  the  last  bar  is  lightly  dominant,  but  there  is  a  very  equal 


3G0 


THE  ELEMENTS  OF  DRA  WING. 


current  of  power  running  through  the  whole  ;  and  such  pas- 
sages rarely  weary.  And  this  principle  holds  through  vast 
scales  of  arrangement ;  so  that  in  the  grandest  compositions, 
such  as  Paul  Veronese's  Marriage  in  Cana,  or  Raphael's  Dis- 
puta,  it  is  not  easy  to  fix  at  once  on  the  principal  figure ;  and 
very  commonly  the  figure  which  is  really  chief  does  not  catch 
the  eye  at  first,  but  is  gradually  felt  to  be  more  and  more 
conspicuous  as  wre  gaze.  Thus  in  Titian's  grand  composition 
of  the  Cornaro  Family,  the  figure  meant  to  be  principal  is  a 
youth  of  fifteen  or  sixteen,  whose  portrait  it  was  evidently  the 
painter's  object  to  make  as  interesting  as  possible.  But  a 
grand  Madonna,  and  a  St.  George  with  a  drifting  banner,  and 
many  figures  more,  occupy  the  centre  of  the  picture,  and  first 
catch  the  eye  ;  little  by  little  we  are  led  away  from  them  to  a 
gleam  of  pearly  light  in  the  lower  corner,  and  find  that,  from 
the  head  which  it  shines  upon,  wTe  can  turn  our  eyes  no  more. 

As,  in  every  good  picture,  nearly  all  laws  of  design  are  more 
or  less  exemplified,  it  will,  on  the  whole,  be  an  easier  wray  of 
explaining  them  to  analyse  one  composition  thoroughly,  than 
to  give  instances  from  various  works.  I  shall  therefore  take 
one  of  Turner's  simplest ;  which  will  allow  us,  so  to  speak, 
easily  to  decompose  it,  and  illustrate  each  law  by  it  as  we 
proceed. 

Figure  32.  is  a  rude  sketch  of  the  arrangement  of  the  whole 
subject  ;  the  old  bridge  over  the  Moselle  at  Coblentz,  the 
town  of  Coblentz  on  the  right,  Ehrenbreitstein  on  the  left. 
The  leading  or  master  feature  is,  of  course  the  tower  on  the 
bridge.  It  is  kept  from  being  too  principal  by  an  important 
group  on  each  side  of  it ;  the  boats,  on  the  right,  and  Ehren- 
breitstein beyond.  The  boats  are  large  in  mass,  and  more 
forcible  in  colour,  but  they  are  broken  into  small  divisions, 
while  the  tower  is  simple,  and  therefore  it  still  leads.  Ehren- 
breitstein is  noble  in  its  mass,  but  so  reduced  by  aerial  per- 
spective of  colour  that  it  cannot  contend  with  the  tower,  which 
therefore  holds  the  eye,  and  becomes  the  key  of  the  picture 
We  shall  see  presently  how  the  very  objects  which  seem  at 
first  to  contend  wdth  it  for  the  mastery  are  made,  occultly  to 
increase  its  preeminence. 


ON  COLOUR  AND  COMPOSITION. 


3G1 


2.   THE  LAW  OF  REPETITION. 

Another  important  means  of  expressing  unity  is  to  mark 
some  kind  of  sympathy  among  the  different  objects,  and  per- 
haps the  pleasantest,  because  most  surprising,  kind  of  sym- 
pathy, is  when  one  group  imitates  or  repeats  another  ;  not  in 
the  way  of  balance  or  symmetry,  but  subordinately,  like  a  far- 
away and  broken  echo  of  it.  Prout  has  insisted  much  on  this 
law  in  all  his  writings  on  composition  ;  and  I  think  it  is  even 


Fig.  32. 


more  authoritatively  present  in  the  minds  of  most  great  com- 
posers than  the  law  of  principality.  It  is  quite  curious  to  sea 
the  pains  that  Turner  sometimes  takes  to  echo  an  important 
passage  of  colour  ;  in  the  Pembroke  Castle  for  instance,  there 
are  two  fishing-boats,  one  with  a  red,  and  another  with  a  white 
sail.  In  a  line  with  them,  on  the  beach,  are  two  fish  in  pre- 
cisely the  same  relative  positions  ;  one  red  and  one  white.  It 
is  observable  that  he  uses  the  artifice  chiefly  in  pictures  where 
lie  wishes  to  obtain  an  expression  of  repose  :  in  my  notice  of 
the  plate  of  Scarborough,  in  the  series  of  the  "  Harbours  of 
England,"  I  have  already  had  occasion  to  dwTell  on  this  point ; 


362 


THE  ELEMENTS  OF  DBA  WING: 


and  I  extract  in  the  note  *  one  or  two  sentences  which  explain 
the  principle.  In  the  composition  I  have  chosen  for  our  illus- 
tration, this  reduplication  is  employed  to  a  singular  extent. 
The  tower,  or  leading  feature,  is  first  repeated  by  the  low  echo 
of  it  to  the  left ;  put  your  finger  over  this  lower  tower,  and  see 
how  the  picture  is  spoiled.  Then  the  spires  of  Coblentz  are 
all  arranged  in  couples  (how  they  are  arranged  in  reality  does 
not  matter  ;  when  we  are  composing  a  great  picture,  we  must 
play  the  towers  about  till  they  come  right,  as  fearlessly  as  if 
they  were  chessmen  instead  of  cathedrals).  The  dual  arrange- 
ment of  these  towers  would  have  been  too  easily  seen,  were  it 
not  for  a  little  one  which  pretends  to  make  a  triad  of  the  lasfc 
group  on  the  right,  but  is  so  faint  as  hardly  to  be  discernible  : 
it  just  takes  off  the  attention  from  the  artifice,  helped  in  doing 
so  by  the  mast  at  the  head  of  the  boat,  which,  however,  has 
instantly  its  own  duplicate  put  at  the  stern. f  Then  there  is 
the  large  boat  near,  and  its  echo  beyond  it.  That  echo  is  di- 
vided into  two  again,  and  each  of  those  two  smaller  boats  has 
two  figures  in  it ;  while  two  figures  are  also  sitting  together 
on  the  great  rudder  that  lies  half  in  the  water,  and  half  aground. 
Then,  finally,  the  great  mass  of  Ehrenbreitstein,  which  ap-, 
pears  at  first  to  have  no  answering  form,  has  almost  its  fac- 
simile in  the  bank  on  which  the  girl  is  sitting ;  this  bank  is 
as  absolutely  essential  to  the  completion  of  the  picture  as  any 
object  in  the  whole  series.  All  this  is  done  to  deepen  the  ef- 
fect of  repose. 

Symmetry  or  the  balance  of  parts  or  masses  in  nearly  equal 
opposition,  is  one  of  the  conditions  of  treatment  under  the 

*  "In  general,  throughout  Nature,  reflection  and  repetition  are  peace- 
ful things,  associated  with  the  idea  of  quiet  succession  in  events,  that 
one  day  should  be  like  another  day,  or  one  history  the  repetition  of  an- 
other history,  being  more  or  less  results  of  quietness,  while  dissimilarity 
and  non -succession  are  results  of  interference  and  disquietude.  Thus, 
though  an  echo  actually  increases  the  quantity  of  sound  heard,  its  rep- 
etition of  the  note  or  syllable  gives  an  idea  of  calmness  attainable  in  no 
other  way  ;  hence  also  the  feeling  of  calm  given  to  a  landscape  by  the 
voice  of  a  cuckoo." 

f  This  is  obscure  in  the  rude  woodcut,  the  masts  being  so  delicate 
that  they  are  confused  among  the  lines  of  reflection.  In  the  original 
they  have  orange  light  upon  them,  relieved  against  purple  behind. 


ON  COLOUR  AND  COMPOSITION. 


363 


law  of  Repetition.  For  the  opposition,  in  a  symmetrical  ob- 
ject, is  of  like  things  reflecting  each  other  ;  it  is  not  the  bal- 
ance of  contrary  natures  (like  that  of  day  and  night)  but  of 
like  natures  or  like  forms  ;  one  side  of  a  leaf  being  set  like  the 
reflection  of  the  other  in  water. 

Symmetry  in  Nature  is,  however,  never  formal  nor  accurate. 
She  takes  the  greatest  care  to  secure  some  difference  between 
the  corresponding  things  or  parts  of  things ;  and  an  approx- 
imation to  accurate  symmetry  is  only  permitted  in  animals 
because  their  motions  secure  perpetual  difference  between  the 
balancing  parts.  Stand  before  a  mirror ;  hold  your  arms  in 
precisely  the  same  position  at  each  side,  your  head  upright 
your  body  straight  ;  divide  your  hair  exactly  in  the  middle, 
and  get  it  as  nearly  as  you  can  into  exactly  the  same  shape 
over  each  ear.  and  you  will  see  the  effect  of  accurate  symme- 
try ;  you  will  see,  no  less,  how  all  grace  and  power  in  the 
human  form  result  from  the  interference  of  motion  and  life 
with  symmetry,  and  from  the  reconciliation  of  its  balance  with 
its  changefulness.  Your  position,  as  seen  in  the  mirror,  is 
the  highest  type  of  symmetry  as  understood  by  modern  ar- 
chitects. 

In  many  sacred  compositions,  living  symmetry,  the  balance 
of  harmonious  opposites,  is  one  of  the  profoundest  sources  of 
their  power  :  almost  any  works  of  the  early  painters,  Angelico, 
Perugino,  Giotto,  &c,  will  furnish  you  with  notable  instances 
of  it.  The  Madonna  of  Perugino  in  the  National  Gallery,  with 
the  angel  Michael  on  one  side  and  Raphael  on  the  other,  is  as 
beautiful  an  example  as  you  can  have. 

In  landscape,  the  principle  of  balance  is  more  or  less  carried 
out,  in  proportion  to  the  wish  of  the  painter  to  express  dis- 
ciplined calmness.  In  bad  compositions  as  in  bad  archi- 
tecture, it  is  formal,  a  tree  on  one  side  answering  a  tree  on 
the  other  ;  but  in  good  compositions,  as  in  graceful  statues,  it 
is  always  easy,  and  sometimes  hardly  traceable.  In  the  Co- 
blentz,  however,  you  cannot  have  much  difficulty  in  seeing  how 
the  boats  on  one  side  of  the  tower  and  the  figures  on  the  other 
are  set  in  nearly  equal  balance  :  the  tower,  as  a  central  mas3 
uniting  both. 


364 


THE  ELEMENTS  OF  DRAWING. 


3.   THE  LAW  OF  CONTINUITY. 

Another  important  and  pleasurable  way  of  expressing  unity, 
is  by  giving  some  orderly  succession  to  a  number  of  objects 
more  or  less  similar.  And  this  succession  is  most  interesting 
when  it  is  connected  with  some  gradual  change  in  the  aspect 
or  character  of  the  objects.  Thus  the  succession  of  the  pillars 
of  a  cathedral  aisle  is  most  interesting  when  they  retire  in 
perspective,  becoming  more  and  more  obscure  in  distance  ;  so 
the  succession  of  mountain  promontories  one  behind  another, 
on  the  flanks  of  a  valley  ;  so  the  succession  of  clouds,  fading 
farther  and  farther  towards  the  horizon  ;  each  promontory 
and  each  cloud  being  of  different  shape,  yet  all  evidently  fol- 
lowing in  a  calm  and  appointed  order.  If  there  be  no  change 
at  all  in  the  shape  or  size  of  the  objects,  there  is  no  continuity  ; 
there  is  only  repetition — monotony.  It  is  the  change  in  shape 
which  suggests  the  idea  of  their  being  individually  free,  and 
able  to  escape,  if  they  liked,  from  the  law  that  rules  them, 
and  yet  submitting  to  it.  I  will  leave  our  chosen  illustrative 
composition  for  a  moment  to  take  up  another,  still  more  ex- 
pressive of  this  law.  It  is  one  of  Turners  most  tender  studies, 
a  sketch  on  Calais  Sands  at  sunset ;  so  delicate  in  the  expres- 
sion of  wave  and  cloud,  that  it  is  of  no  use  for  me  to  try  to 
reach  it  witli  any  kind  of  outline  in  a  woodcut ;  but  the  rough 
sketch,  Fig.  33.,  is  enough  to  give  an  idea  of  its  arrangement. 
The  aim  of  the  painter  has  been  to  give  the  intensest  expres- 
sion of  repose,  together  with  the  enchanted  lulling,  monoto- 
nous motion  of  cloud  and  wave.  All  the  clouds  are  moving 
in  innumerable*  ranks  after  the  sun,  meeting  towards  the 
point  in  the  horizon  where  he  has  set ;  and  the  tidal  waves 
gain  in  winding  currents  upon  the  sand,  with  that  stealthy 
haste  in  which  they  cross  each  other  so  quietly,  at  their  edges  : 
just  folding  one  over  another  as  they  meet,  like  a  little  piece 
of  ruffled  silk,  and  leaping  up  a  little  as  two  children  kiss  and 
clap  their  hands,  and  then  going  on  again,  each  in  its  silent 
hurry,  drawing  pointed  arches  on  the  sand  as  their  thin  edges 
intersect  in  parting  ;  but  all  this  would  not  have  been  enough 
expressed  without  the  line  of  the  old  pier-timbers,  black  witb 


ON  COLOUR  AND  COMPOSITION 


365 


weeds,  strained  and  bent  by  the  storm  waves,  and  now  seem- 
ing to  stoop  in  following  one  another,  like  dark  ghosts  escap- 
ing slowly  from  the  cruelty  of  the  pursuing  sea. 

I  need  not,  I  hope,  point  out  to  the  reader  the  illustration 
of  this  law  of  continuance  in  the  subject  chosen  for  our  gen- 
eral illustration.  It  was  simply  that  gradual  succession  of  the 
retiring  arches  of  the  bridge  which  induced  Turner  to  paint 
the  subject  at  all  ;  and  it  was  this  same  principle  which  led 
him  always  to  seize  on  subjects  including  long  bridges  where- 
ever  he  could  find  them  ;  but  especially,  observe,  unequal 


Fiq.  33. 


bridges,  having  the  highest  arch  at  one  side  rather  than  at 
the  centre.  There  is  a  reason  for  this,  irrespective  of  general 
laws  of  composition,  and  connected  with  the  nature  of  rivers, 
which  I  may  as  well  stop  a  minute  to  tell  you  about,  and  let 
you  rest  from  the  study  of  composition. 

All  rivers,  small  or  large,  agree  in  one  character,  they  like 
lo  lean  a  little  on  one  side  :  they  cannot  bear  to  have  their 
channels  deepest  in  the  middle,  but  will  always,  if  they  can, 
have  one  bank  to  sun  themselves  upon,  and  another  to  get 
cool  under  ;  one  shingly  shore  to  play  over,  where  they  may 
be  shallow,  and  foolish,  and  childlike,  and  another  steep  shore, 
under  which  they  can  pause,  and  purify  themselves,  and  get 


866 


THE  ELEMENTS  OF  DBA  WING. 


their  strength  of  waves  fully  together  for  due  occasion. 
Rivers  in  this  wa}r  are  just  like  wise  men,  who  keep  one  side 
of  their  life  for  play,  and  another  for  work  ;  and  can  be  brill- 
iant, and  chattering,  and  transparent,  when  they  are  at  ease, 
and  yet  take  deep  counsel  on  the  other  side  when  they  set 
themselves  to  their  main  purpose.  And  rivers  are  just  in  this 
divided,  also,  like  wicked  and  good  men  :  the  good  rivers  have 
serviceable  deep  places  all  along  their  banks,  that  ships  can 
sail  in  ;  but  the  wicked  rivers  go  scoopingly  irregularly  under 
their  banks  until  they  get  full  of  strangling  eddies,  which  no 
boat  can  row  over  without  being  twisted  against  the  rocks  ; 
and  pools  like  wells,  which  no  one  can  get  out  of  but  the 
water-kelpie  that  lives  at  the  bottom  ; — but,  wicked  or  good, 
the  rivers  all  agree  in  having  two  kinds  of  sides.  Now  the 
natural  way  in  which  a  village  stonemason  therefore  throws 
a  bridge  over  a  strong  stream  is,  of  course,  to  build  a  great 
door  to  let  the  cat  through,  and  little  doors  to  let  the  kittens 
through  ;  a  great  arch  for  the  great  current,  to  give  it  room 
in  flood  time,  and  little  arches  for  the  little  currents  along 
the  shallow  shore.  This,  even  without  any  prudential  respect 
for  the  floods  of  the  great  current,  he  would  do  in  simple 
economy  of  work  and  stone  ;  for  the  smaller  your  arches  are, 
the  less  material  you  want  on  their  flanks.  Two  arches  over 
the  same  span  of  river,  supposing  the  butments  are  at  the 
same  depth,  are  cheaper  than  one,  and  that  by  a  great  deal  ; 
so  that,  where  the  current  is  shallow,  the  village  mason  makes 
his  arches  many  and  low  ;  as  the  water  gets  deeper,  and  it 
becomes  troublesome  to  build  his  piers  up  from  the  bottom, 
he  throws  his  arches  wider  ;  at  last  he  comes  to  the  deep 
stream,  and,  as  he  cannot  build  at  the  bottom  of  that,  he 
throws  his  largest  arch  over  it  with  a  leap,  and  with  another 
little  one  or  so  gains  the  opposite  shore.  Of  course  as  arches 
are  wider  they  must  be  higher,  or  they  will  not  stand  ;  so  the 
roadway  must  rise  as  the  arches  widen.  And  thus  we  have 
the  general  type  of  bridge,  with  its  highest  and  widest  arch 
towards  one  side,  and  a  train  of  minor  arches  running  over 
the  flat  shore  on  the  other  ;  usually  a  steep  bank  at  the  river- 
side next  the  large  arch  ;  always,  of  course,  a  flat  shore  on 


ON  COLOUR  AND  COMPOSITION  367 


the  side  of  the  small  ones  ;  and  the  bend  of  the  river  assuredly 
concave  towards  this  flat,  cutting  round,  with  a  sweep  into 
the  steep  bank  ;  or,  if  there  is  no  steep  bank,  still  assuredly 
cutting  into  the  shore  at  the  steep  end  of  the  bridge. 

Now  this  kind  of  bridge,  sympathising,  as  it  does,  with  the 
spirit  of  the  river,  and  marking  the  nature  of  the  thing  it  has 
to  deal  with  and  conquer,  is  the  ideal  of  a  bridge  ;  and  all  en- 
deavours to  do  the  thing  in  a  grand  engineer's  manner,  with 
a  level  roadway  and  equal  arches,  are  barbarous ;  not  only  be- 
cause all  monotonous  forms  are  ugly  in  themselves,  but  be- 
cause the  mind  perceives  at  once  that  there  has  been  cost 
uselessly  thrown  away  for  the  sake  of  formality.* 

Well,  to  return  to  our  continuity.  We  see  that  the  Tur- 
nerian  bridge  in  Fig.  32.  is  of  the  absolutely  perfect  type,  and 
is  still  farther  interesting  by  having  its  main  arch  crowned  by 
a  watch-tower.  But  as  I  want  you  to  note  especially  what 
perhaps  was  not  the  case  in  the  real  bridge,  but  is  entirely 
Turner's  doing,  you  will  find  that  though  the  arches  diminish 
gradually,  not  one  is  regularly  diminished — they  are  all  of 

*  The  cost  of  art  in  getting  a  bridge  level  is  always  lost,  for  you  must 
get  up  to  the  height  of  the  central  arch  at  any  rate,  and  you  only  can 
make  the  whole  bridge  level  by  putting  the  hill  farther  back,  and  pre- 
tending to  have  got  rid  of  it  when  you  have  not,  but  have  only  wasted 
money  in  building  an  unnecessary  embankment.  Of  course,  the  bridge 
should  not  be  difficultly  or  dangerously  steep,  but  the  necessary  slope, 
whatever  it  may  be,  should  be  in  the  bridge  itself,  as  far  as  the  bridge 
can  take  it,  and  not  pushed  aside  into  the  approach,  as  in  our  Waterloo 
road  ;  the  only  rational  excuse  for  doing  which  is  that  when  the  slope 
must  be  long  it  is  inconvenient  to  put  on  a  drag  at  the  top  of  the  bridge, 
and  that  any  restiveness  of  the  horse  is  more  dangerous  on  the  bridge 
than  on  the  embankment.  To  this  I  answer  :  first,  it  is  not  more  dan- 
gerous in  reality,  though  it  looks  so,  for  the  bridge  is  always  guarded  by 
an  effective  parapet,  but  the  embankment  is  sure  to  have  no  parapet,  or 
only  a  useless  rail  ;  and  secondly,  that  it  is  better  to  have  the  slope  on 
the  bridge,  and  make  the  roadway  wide  in  proportion,  so  as  to  be  quite 
safe,  because  a  little  waste  of  space  on  the  river  is  no  loss,  but  your 
wide  embankment  at  the  side  loses  good  ground  ;  and  so  my  picturesque 
bridges  are  right  as  well  as  beautiful,  and  I  hope  to  see  them  built  again 
some  day,  instead  of  the  frightful  straight-backed  things  which  we 
fancy  are  fine,  and  accept  from  the  pontifical  rigidities  of  the  engineer* 
ing  mind. 


368 


THE  ELEMENTS  OF  BRA  WING. 


different  shapes  and  sizes  :  you  cannot  see  this  clearly  in  Fig. 
32.,  but  in  the  larger  diagram,  Fig.  34.,  opposite,  you  will 
with  ease.  This  is  indeed  also  part  of  the  ideal  of  a  bridge, 
because  the  lateral  currents  near  the  shore  are  of  course  ir- 
regular in  size,  and  a  simple  builder  would  naturally  vary  his 
arches  accordingly  ;  and  also,  if  the  bottom  was  rocky,  build 
his  piers  where  the  rocks  came.  But  it  is  not  as  a  part  of 
bridge  ideal,  but  as  a  necessity  of  all  noble  composition,  that 
this  irregularity  is  introduced  by  Turner.  It  at  once  raises 
the  object  thus  treated  from  the  lower  or  vulgar  unity  of  rigid 
law  to  the  greater  unity  of  clouds,  and  waves,  and  trees,  and 
human  souls,  each  different,  each  obedient,  and  each  in  har- 
monious service. 

4.   THE  LAW  OF  CURVATURE. 

There  is,  however,  another  point  to  be  noticed  in  this  bridge 
of  Turner's.  Not  only  does  it  slope  away  unequally  at  its 
sides,  but  it  slopes  in  a  gradual  though  very  subtle  curve. 
And  if  you  substitute  a  straight  line  for  this  curve  (drawing 
one  with  a  rule  from  the  base  of  the  tower  on  each  side  to  the 
ends  of  the  bridge,  in  Fig.  34.,  and  effacing  the  curve),  you 
will  instantly  see  that  the  design  has  suffered  grievously. 
Ton  may  ascertain,  by  experiment,  that  all  beautiful  objects 
whatsoever  are  thus  terminated  by  delicately  curved  lines,  ex- 
cept where  the  straight  line  is  indispensable  to  their  use  or 
stability  :  and  that  when  a  complete  system  of  straight  lines, 
throughout  the  form,  is  necessary  to  that  stability,  as  in  ciys- 
tals,  the  beauty,  if  any  exists,  is  in  colour  and  transparency, 
not  in  form.  Cut  out  the  shape  of  any  crystal  you  like,  in 
white  wax  or  wood,  and  put  it  beside  a  white  lily,  and  you 
will  feel  the  force  of  the  curvature  in  its  purity,  irrespective 
of  added  colour,  or  other  interfering  elements  of  beauty. 

Weil,  as  curves  are  more  beautiful  than  straight  lines,  it  is 
necessary  to  a  good  composition  that  its  continuities  of  object, 
mass,  or  colour  should  be,  if  possible,  in  curves,  rather  than 
btraight  lines  or  angular  ones.  Perhaps  one  of  the  simplest 
and  prettiest  examples  of  a  graceful  continuity  of  this  kind  is 
in  the  line  traced  at  any  moment  by  the  corks  of  a  net  as  it 


ON  COLOUR  AND  COMPOSITION 


370 


THE  ELEMENTS  OF  1)11 A  WING. 


is  being  drawn :  nearly  every  person  i3  more  or  less  attracted 
by  the  beauty  of  the  dotted  line.  Now  it  is  almost  always 
possible,  not  only  to  secure  such  a  continuity  in  the  arrange- 
ment or  boundaries  of  objects  which,  like  these  bridge  arches 
or  the  corks  of  the  net,  are  actually  connected  with  each  other, 
but — and  this  is  a  still  more  noble  and  interesting  kind  of 
continuity — among  features  which  appear  at  first  entirely 
separate.  Thus  the  towers  of  Ehrenbreitstein,  on  the  left,  in 
Fig.  32.,  appear  at  first  independent  of  each  other;  but  when 


Fig.  85. 

I  give  their  profile,  on  a  larger  scale,  Fig.  35.,  the  reader  may 
easily  perceive  that  there  is  a  subtle  cadence  and  harmony 
among  them.  The  reason  of  this  is,  that  they  are  all  bounded 
by  one  grand  curve,  traced  by  the  dotted  line  ;  out  of  the 
seven  towers,  four  precisely  touch  this  curve,  the  others  only 
falling  back  from  it  here  and  there  to  keep  the  eye  from  dis 
covering  it  too  easily. 

And  it  is  not  only  always  possible  to  obtain  continuities  of 
this  kind  :  it  is,  in  drawing  large  forest  or  mountain  forms  es- 


ON  COLOUR  AND  COMPOSITION. 


sential  to  truth.  The  towers  of  Ehrenbreitstein  might  or 
might  not  in  reality  fall  into  such  a  curve,  but  assuredly  the 
basalt  rock  on  which  they  stand  did  ;  for  all  mountain  forms 
not  cloven  into  absolute  precipice,  nor  covered  by  straight 
slopes  of  shales,  are  more  or  less  governed  by  these  great 
curves,  it  being  one  of  the  aims  of  Nature  in  all  her  work  to 
produce  them.  The  reader  must  already  know  this,  if  he  has 
been  able  to  sketch  at  all  among  the  mountains  ;  if  not,  let 
him  merely  draw  for  himself,  carefully,  the  outlines  of  any 
low  hills  accessible  to  him,  where  they  are  tolerably  steep,  or 
of  the  woods  which  grow  on  them.  The  steeper  shore  of  the 
Thames  at  Maidenhead,  or  any  of  the  downs  at  Brighton  or 
Dover,  or,  even  nearer,  about  Croydon  (as  Addington  Hills), 
are  easily  accessible  to  a  Londoner  ;  and  he  will  soon  find  not 
only  how  constant,  but  how  graceful  the  curvature  is.  Grace- 
ful curvature  is  distinguished  from  ungraceful  by  two  charac- 
ters :  first,  its  moderation,  that  is  to  say,  its  close  approach  to 
straightness  in  some  parts  of  its  course  ;  *  and,  secondly,  by 
its  variation,  that  is  to  say,  its  never  remaining  equal  in  de- 
gree at  different  parts  of  its  course. 

This  variation  is  itself  twofold  in  all  good  curves. 

A.  There  is,  first,  a  steady  change  through  the  whole  line 
from  less  to  more  curvature,  or  more  to  less,  so  that  no  part 


Pig.  36. 

of  the  line  is  a  segment  of  a  circle,  or  can  be  drawn  by  com- 
passes in  any  way  whatever.  Thus,  in  Fig.  36.,  a  is  a  bad 
curve,  because  it  is  part  of  a  circle,  and  is  therefore  monoto- 
nous throughout ;  but  b  is  a  good  curve,  because  it  continu- 
ally changes  its  direction  as  it  proceeds. 

*  I  cannot  waste  space  here  by  reprinting  what  1  have  said  in  other 
books:  but  the  reader  ought,  if  possible,  to  refer  to  the  notices  of  this 
part  of  our  subject  in  ''Modern  Painters,"  vol.  iv.  chap,  xviii.,  and 
'•Stones  of  Venice/'  vol.  iii.  chap.  i.  §  8. 


372 


THE  ELEMENTS  OF  DBA  WING, 


Fig.  37. 


The  first  difference  between  good  and  bad  drawing  of  trea 
boughs  consists  in  observance  of  this  fact.  Thus,  when  I  put 
leaves  on  the  line  6,  as  in  Fig.  37.,  you 
can  immediately  feel  the  springiness 
of  character  dependent  on  the  change- 
fulness  of  the  curve.  You  may  put 
leaves  on  the  other  line  for  yourself, 
but  you  will  find  you  cannot  make  a  right  tree  spray  of  it. 
For  all  tree  boughs,  large  or  small,  as  well  as  all  noble  nat- 
ural lines  whatsoever,  agree  in  this  character ;  and  it  is  a 
point  of  primal  necessity  that 
your  eye  should  always  seize 
and  your  hand  trace  it.  Here 
are  two  more  portions  of  good 
curves,  with  leaves  put  on  them 
at  the  extremities  instead  of  the 
flanks,  Fig.  38.  ;  and  two  show- 
ing the  arrangement  of  masses 
of  foliage  seen  a  little  farther 
off,  Fig.  39.,  which  you  may  in 
like  manner  amuse  yourself  by 
turning  into  segments  of  circles 
■ — you  will  see  with  what  result, 
beside  you  by  this  time,  many  good  studies  of  tree  boughs 
carefully  made,  in  which  you  may  study 
variations  of  curvature  in  their  most 
complicated  and  lovely  forms.* 

B.  Not  only  does  every  good  curve 
vary  in  general  tendency,  but  it  is 
modulated,  as  it  proceeds,  by  myriads 
of  subordinate  curves.  Thus  the  out- 
lines of  a  tree  trunk  are  never  as  at  a3 
Fig.  40,  but  as  at  b.  So  also  in  waves, 
clouds,  and  all  other  nobly  formed  masses.  Thus  another 
essential  difference  between  good  and  bad  drawing,  or  good 
and  bad  sculpture,  depends  on  the  quantity  and  refinement 

*  If  you  happen  to  be  reading  at  this  part  of  the  book,  without  haying 
gone  through  any  previous  practice,  turn  back  to  the  sketch  of  the 


Fig.  38. 

I  hope,  however,  you  have 


Fig.  89. 


ON  COLOUR  AND  COMPOSITION 


373 


of  minor  curvatures  carried,  by  good  work,  into  the  great  lines. 
Strictly  speaking,  however,  this  is  not  variation  in  large  curves, 
but  composition  of  large  curves  out  of 
small  ones  ;  it  is  an  increase  in  the  quantity 
of  the  beautiful  element,  but  not  a  change 
in  its  nature. 

5.  THE  LAW  OF  RADIATION. 

We  hdve  hitherto  been  concerned  only 
with  the  binding  of  our  various  objects 
into  beautiful  lines  or  processions.  The 
next  point  we  have  to  consider  is,  how  we 
may  unite  these  lines  or  processions  them- 
selves, so  as  to  make  groups  of  them. 

Now,  there  are  two  kinds  of  harmonies  of 
lines.  One  in  wdiich,  moving  more  or  less 
side  by  side,  they  variously,  but  evidently 
with  consent,  retire  from  cr  approach  each 
other,  intersect  or  oppose  each  other  :  cur- 
rents of  melody  in  music,  for  different 
voices,  thus  approach  and  cross,  fall  and 
rise,  in  harmony  ;  so  the  waves  of  the  sea, 
as  they  approach  the  shore,  flow  into  one 
another  or  cross,  but  with  a  great  unity 
through  all ;  and  so  various  lines  of  com- 
position often  flow  harmoniously  through 
and  across  each  other  in  a  picture.  But  the  most  simple  and 
perfect  connexion  of  lines  is  by  radiation  ;  that  is,  by  their 
all  springing  from  one  point,  or  closing  towards  it :  and  this 
harmony  is  often,  in  Nature  almost  always,  united  with  the 
other  ;  as  the  boughs  of  trees,  though  they  intersect  and  play 
amongst  each  other  irregularly,  indicate  by  their  general  ten- 
dency their  origin  from  one  root.  An  essential  part  of  the 
beauty  of  all  vegetable  form  is  in  this  radiation :  it  is  seen 
most  simply  in  a  single  flower  or  leaf,  as  in  a  convolvulus 

ramification  of  stone  pine,  Fig.  4.  page  30.,  and  examine  the  curves  of 
its  boughs  one  by  one,  trying  them  by  the  conditions  here  stated  undei 
the  heads  A.  and  B. 


371 


THE  ELEMENTS  OF  DRAWING. 


bell,  or  chestnut  leaf ;  but  more  beautifully  in  the  compli- 
cated arrangements  of  the  large  boughs  and  sprays.  For 
a  leaf  is  only  a  flat  piece  of  radiation  ;  but  the  tree  throws  its 
branches  on  all  sides,  and  even  in  every  profile  view  of  it, 
which  presents  a  radiation  more  or  less  correspondent  to  that 
of  its  leaves,  it  is  more  beautiful,  because  varied  by  the  free- 
dom of  the  separate  branches.  I  believe  it  has  been  ascer- 
tained that,  in  all  trees,  the  angle  at  which,  in  their  leaves, 
the  lateral  ribs  are  set  on  their  central  rib  is  approximately 
the  same  at  which  the  branches  leave  the 
great  stem  ;  and  thus  each  section  of  the 
tree  would  present  a  kind  of  magnified 
view  of  its  own  leaf,  were  it  not  for  the  in- 
terfering force  of  gravity  on  the  masses  of 
foliage.  This  force  in  proportion  to  their 
age,  and  the  lateral  leverage  upon  them, 
bears  them  downwards  at  the  extremities, 
so  that,  as  before  noticed,  the  lower  the 
bough  grows  on  the  stem,  the  more  it  droops 
(Fig.  17,  p.  295.)  ;  besides  this,  nearly  all 
beautiful  trees  have  a  tendency  to  divide  into  two  or  more 
principal  masses,  which  give  a  prettier  and  more  complicated 
symmetry  than  if  one  stem  ran  all  the  way  up  the  centre. 
Fig.  41.  may  thus  be  considered  the  simplest  type  of  tree 
radiation,  as  opposed  to  leaf  radiation.  In  this  figure,  how- 
ever, all  secondary  ramification  is  unrepresented,  for 
the  sake  of  simplicity  ;  but  if  we  take  one  half  of 
such  a  tree,  and  merely  give  two  secondary  branches 
to  each  main  branch  (as  represented  in  the  general 


Fig.  41. 


Fig.  42. 


branch  structure  shown  at  b,  Fig.  18.,  p.  296),  we 
shall  have  the  form,  Fig.  42.  This  I  consider  the 
perfect  general  type  of  tree  structure  ;  and  it  is  curi- 
ously connected  with  certain  forms  of  Greek,  Byzan- 
tine, and  Gothic  ornamentation,  into  the  discussion 
of  which,  however,  we  must  not  enter  here.  It  will  be  ob- 
served, that  both  in  Figs.  41.  and  42.  all  the  branches  so  spring 
from  the  main  stem  as  very  nearly  to  suggest  their  united 
radiation  from  the  root  e.    This  is  by  no  means  universally 


ON  COLOUR  AND  COMPOSITION. 


375 


Fig.  43. 


/ 


the  case  ;  but  if  the  branches  do  not  bend  towards  a  point  in 
the  root,  they  at  least  converge  to  some  point  or  other.  In 
the  examples  in  Fig.  43.,  the  mathematical  centre  of  curvature, 
a,  is  thus,  in  one  case,  on  the 
ground  at  some  distance  from 
the  root,  and  in  the  other,  near 
the  top  of  the  tree.  Half,  only, 
of  each  tree  is  given,  for  the 
sake  of  clearness :  Fig.  44 
gives  both  sides  of  another  ex-  4 
ample,  in  which  the  origins  of  a  ^* 
curvature  are  below  the  root. 
As  the  positions  of  such  points 
may  be  varied  without  end,  and  as  the  arrangement  of  the  lines 
is  also  farther  complicated  by  the  fact  of  the  boughs  springing 
for  the  most  part  in  a  spiral  order  round  the  tree, 
and  at  proportionate  distances,  the  systems  of  curva- 
ture which  regulate  the  form  of  vegetation  are  quite 
infinite.  Infinite  is  a  word  easily  said,  and  easily 
written,  and  people  do  not  always  mean  it  when  they 
say  it ;  in  this  case  I  do  mean  it ;  the  number  of 
systems  is  incalculable,  and  even  to  furnish  any 
thing  like  a  representative  number  of  types,  I  should 
\{J  have  to  give  several  hundreds  of  figures  such  as 
Fig.  44.* 

Thus  far,  however,  we  have  only  been  speaking 
of  the  great  relations  of  stem  and  branches.  The 
jf     \l    forms  of  the  branches  themselves  are  regulated  by 
I       I    still  more  subtle  laws,  for  they  occupy  an  interme- 
nt      &    cliate  position  between  the  form  of  the  tree  and  of 
fiq.  44-     the  leaf.    The  leaf  has  a  fiat  ramification  ;  the  tree 
a  completely  rounded  one  ;  the  bough  is  neither  rounded  nor 
flat,  but  has  a  structure  exactly  balanced  between  the  two,  in 
a  half-flattened,  half-rounded  flake,  closely  resembling  in  shape 
one  of  the  thick  leaves  of  an  artichoke  or  the  flake  of  a  fir  cone  ; 
by  combination  forming  the  solid  mass  of  the  tree,  as  the 

*  The  reader,  I  hope,  observes  always  that  every  line  in  these  figures 
is  itself  one  of  varying  curvature,  and  cannot  be  drawn  by  compasses. 


376  TEE  ELEMENTS  OF  DRAWING. 

leaves  compose  the  artichoke  head.  I  have  before  pointed  out 
to  you  the  general  resemblance  of  these  branch  flakes  to  an 
extended  hand  ;  but  they  may  be  more  accurately  represented 
by  the  ribs  of  a  boat.    If  you  can  imagine  a  very  broad-headed 

and  flattened  boat  applied 
by  its  keel  to  the  end  of  a 
main  branch,*  as  in  Fig. 
45  ,  the  lines  which  its  ribs 
will  take,  and  the  general 
contour  of  it,  as  seen  in  dif- 
ferent directions,  from  above  and  below  ;  and  from  one  side  and 
another,  will  give  you  the  closest  approximation  to  the  per- 
spectives and  foreshortenings  of  a  well-grown  branch-flake. 
Fig.  25.  above,  page  316.,  is  an  unharmed  and  unrestrained 
shoot  of  healthy  young  oak  ;  and  if  you  compare  it  with  Fig. 
45.,  you  will  understand  at  once  the  action  of  the  lines  of  leaf- 
age ;  the  boat  only  failing  as  a  type  in  that  its  ribs  are  too 
nearly  parallel  to  each  other  at  the  sides,  while  the  bough 
sends  all  its  ramification  well  forwards,  rounding  to  the  head3 
that  it  may  accomplish  its  part 
in  the  outer  form  of  the  whole 
tree,  yet  always  securing  the 
compliance  with  the  great  uni- 
versal law  that  the  branches 
nearest  the  root  bend  most 
back  ;  and,  of  course,  throw- 
ing some  always  back  as  well  as  forwards  ;  the  appearance  of 
reversed  action  being  much  increased,  and  rendered  more 
striking  and  beautiful,  by  perspective.  Figure  25.  shows  the 
perspective  of  such  a  bough  as  it  is  seen  from  below  ;  Fig.  46, 
gives  rudely  the  look  it  would  have  from  above. 

You  may  suppose,  if  you  have  not  already  discovered,  what 

*  I  hope  the  reader  understands  that  these  woodcuts  are  merely  fac- 
similes of  the  sketches  I  make  at  the  side  of  my  paper  to  illustrate  my 
meaning  as  I  write — often  sadly  scrawled  if  I  want  to  get  on  to  some- 
thing else.  This  one  is  really  a  little  too  careless ;  but  it  would  take 
more  time  and  trouble  to  make  a  proper  drawing  of  so  odd  a  boat  than 
the  matter  is  worth.    It  will  answer  the  purpose  well  enough  as  it  is. 


ON  COLOUR  AND  COMPOSITION. 


377 


subtleties  of  perspective  and  light  and  shade  are  involved  in 
the  drawing  of  these  branch-flakes,  as  you  see  them  in  differ- 
ent directions  and  actions ;  now  raised,  now  depressed ; 
touched  on  the  edges  by  the  wind,  or  lifted  up  and  bent  back 
so  as  to  show  all  the  white  under  surfaces  of  the  leaves  shiver- 
ing in  light,  as  the  bottom  of  a  boat  rises  white  with  spray  at 
the  surge-crest ;  or  drooping  in  quietness  towards  the  dew  of 
the  grass  beneath  them  in  windless  mornings,  or  bowed  down 
under  oppressive  grace  of  deep-charged  snow.  Snow  time,  by 
the  way,  is  one  of  the  best  for  practice  in  the  placing  of  tree 
masses  ;  but  you  will  only  be  able  to  understand  them  thor- 
oughly by  beginning  with  a  single  bough  and  a  few  leaves 
placed  tolerably  even,  as  in  Fig.  38.  page  372.  First  one  with 
three  leaves,  a  central  and  two  lateral  ones,  as  at  a  ;  then  with 
five,  as  at  b,  and  so  on  ;  directing  your  whole  attention  to  the 
expression,  both  by  contour  and  light  and  shade,  of  the  boat- 
like arrangements,  which  in  your  earlier  studies,  will  have 
been  a  good  deal  confused,  partly  owing  to  your  inexperience, 
and  partly  to  the  depth  of  shade,  or  absolute  blackness  of  mass 
required  in  those  studies. 

One  thing  more  remains  to  be  noted,  and  I  will  let  you  out 
of  the  wood.  You  see  that  in  every  generally  representative 
figure  I  have  surrounded  the  radiating  branches  with  a  dotted 
line :  such  lines  do  indeed  terminate  every  vegetable  form  ; 
and  you  see  that  they  are  themselves  beautiful  curves,  which, 
according  to  their  flow,  and  the  width  or  narrowness  of  the 
spaces  they  enclose,  characterize  the  species  of  tree  or  leaf, 
and  express  its  free  or  formal  action,  its  grace  of  youth  or 
weight  of  age.  So  that,  throughout  all  the  freedom  of  her 
wildest  foliage,  Nature  is  resolved  on  expressing  an  encom- 
passing limit ;  and  marking  a  unity  in  the  whole  tree,  caused 
not  only  by  the  rising  of  its  branches  from  a  common  root, 
but  by  their  joining  in  one  work,  and  being  bound  by  a  com- 
mon law.  And  having  ascertained  this,  let  us  turn  back  for  a 
moment  to  a  point  in  leaf  structure  which,  I  doubt  not,  you 
must  already  have  observed  in  your  earlier  studies,  but  which 
it  is  well  to  state  here,  as  connected  with  the  unity  of  the 
branches  in  the  great  trees.    You  must  have  noticed,  I  should 


378 


THE  ELEMENTS  OF  DEA  WING. 


think,  that  whenever  a  leaf  is  compound, — that  is  to  say,  di- 
vided into  other  leaflets  which  in  any  way  repeat  or  imitate 
the  form  of  the  whole  leaf, — those  leaflets  are  not  symmetrical, 
as  the  whole  leaf  is,  but  always  smaller  on  the  side  towards 
the  point  of  the  great  leaf,  so  as  to  express  their  subordination 
to  it,  and  show,  even  when  they  are  pulled  off,  that  they  are 
not  small  independent  leaves,  but  members  of  one  large  leaf- 
Fig.  47.,  which  is  a  block-plan  of  a  leaf  of  columbine,  with- 
out its  minor  divisions  on  the  edges,  will  illustrate  the  prin- 
ciple clearly.  It  is  composed  of  a  central  large  mass,  A,  and 
two  lateral  ones,  of  which  the  one  on  the  right  only  is  lettered, 


A 


Fig.  47. 


B.  Each  of  these  masses  is  again  composed  of  three  others, 
a  central  and  two  lateral  ones  ;  but  observe,  the  minor  one,  a 
of  A,  is  balanced  equally  by  its  opposite  ;  but  the  minor  b  1 
of  B  is  larger  than  its  opposite  b  2.  Again,  each  of  these 
minor  masses  is  divided  into  three  ;  but  while  the  central 
mass,  a  of  A,  is  symmetrically  divided,  the  b  of  B  is  un sym- 
metrical, its  largest  side-lobe  being  lowest.  Again  b  2,  the 
lobe  c  1  (its  lowest  lobe  in  relation  to  e)  is  larger  than  c  2  : 
and  so  also  in  b  1.  So  that  universally  one  lobe  of  a  lateral 
leaf  is  always  larger  than  the  other,  and  the  smaller  lobe  is 
that  which  is  nearer  the  central  mass ;  the  lower  leaf,  as  it 


ON  COLOUR  AND  COMPOSITION. 


370 


were  by  courtesy,  subduing  some  of  its  own  dignity  or  power, 
in  the  immediate  presence  of  the  greater  or  captain  leaf  ;  and 
always  expressing,  therefore,  its  own  subordination  and  sec- 
ondary character.  This  law  is  carried  out  even  in  single 
leaves.  As  far  as  I  know,  the  upper  half,  towards  the  point 
of  the  spray,  is  always  the  smaller  ;  and  a  slightly  different 
curve,  more  convex  at  the  springing,  is  used  for  the  lower 
side,  giving  an  exquisite  variety  to  the  form  of  the  whole  leaf ; 
so  that  one  of  the  chief  elements  in  the  beauty  of  every  sub- 
ordinate leaf  throughout  the  tree,  is  made  to  depend  on  its 
confession  of  its  own  lowliness  and  subjection. 

And  now,  if  we  bring  together  in  one  view  the  principles 
we  have  ascertained  in  trees,  we  shall  find  they  may  be 
summed  under  four  great  laws  ;  and  that  all  perfect  *  vege- 
table form  is  appointed  to  express  these  four  laws  in  noble 
balance  of  authority. 

1.  Support  from  one  living  root. 

2.  Radiation,  or  tendency  of  force  from  some  one  given 
point,  either  in  the  root,  or  in  some  stated  connexion  with  it. 

3.  Liberty  of  each  bough  to  seek  its  own  livelihood  and 
happiness  according  to  its  needs,  by  irregularities  of  action 
both  in  its  play  and  its  work,  either  stretching  out  to  get  its 
required  nourishment  from  light  and  rain,  by  finding  some 
sufficient  breathing-place  among  the  other  branches,  or  knot- 
ting and  gathering  itself  up  to  get  strength  for  any  load  which 
its  fruitful  blossoms  may  lay  upon  it,  and  for  any  stress  of  its 
storm-tossed  luxuriance  of  leaves  ;  or  playing  hither  and 
thither  as  the  fitful  sunshine  may  tempt  its  young  shoots,  in 
their  undecided  states  of  mind  about  their  future  life. 

4.  Imperative  requirement  of  each  bough  to  stop  within 
certain  limits,  expressive  of  its  kindly  fellowship  and  f rater- 

*  Imperfect  vegetable  form  I  consider  that  which  is  in  its  nature  de- 
pendent, as  in  runners  and  climbers  ;  or  which  is  susceptible  of  continual 
injury  without  materially  losing  the  power  of  giving  pleasure  by  its 
aspect,  as  in  the  case  of  the  smaller  grasses,  I  have  not,  of  course,  space 
here  to  explain  these  minor  distinctions,  but  the  laws  above  stated  apply 
to  all  the  more  important  trees  and  shrubs  likely  to  be  familiar  to  the 
student. 


380 


THE  ELEMENTS  OF  BRA  WING. 


nity  with  the  boughs  in  its  neighborhood  ;  and  to  work  with 
them  according  to  its  power,  magnitude,  and  state  of  health, 
to  bring  out  the  general  perfectness  of  the  great  curve,  and 
circumferent  stateliness  of  the  whole  tree. 

I  think  I  may  leave  you,  unhelped,  to  work  out  the  moral 
analogies  of  these  laws  ;  you  may,  perhaps,  however,  be  a  little 
puzzled  to  see  the  meeting  of  the  second  one.  It  typically 
expresses  that  healthy  human  actions  should  spring  radiantly 
(like  rays)  from  some  single  heart  motive ;  the  most  beautiful 
systems  of  action  taking  place  when  this  motive  lies  at  the 
root  of  the  whole  life,  and  the  action  is  clearly  seen  to  proceed 
from  it ;  while  also  many  beautiful  secondary  systems  of  action 
taking  place  from  motives  not  so  deep  or  central,  but  in  some 
beautiful  subordinate  connexion  with  the  central  or  life  motive. 

The  other  laws,  if  you  think  over  them,  you  will  find  equally 
significative  ;  and  as  you  draw  trees  more  and  more  in  their 
various  states  of  health  and  hardship,  you  will  be  every  day 
more  struck  by  the  beauty  of  the  types  they  present  of  the 
truths  most  essential  for  mankind  to  know  ;  *  and  you  will  see 
what  this  vegetation  of  the  earth,  which  is  necessary  to  our 
life,  first,  as  purifying  the  air  for  us  and  then  as  food,  and  just 
as  necessary  to  our  joy  in  all  places  of  the  earth, — what  these 
trees  and  leaves,  I  say,  are  meant  to  teach  us  as  we  contem- 
plate them,  and  read  or  hear  their  lovely  language,  written  or 
spoken  for  us,  not  in  frightful  black  letters,  nor  in  dull  sen- 

*  There  is  a  very  tender  lesson  of  this  kind  in  the  shadows  of  leaves 
upon  the  ground  ;  shadows  which  are  the  most  likely  of  all  to  attract 
attention,  by  their  pretty  play  and  change.  If  yon  examine  them,  you 
will  find  that  the  shadows  do  not  take  the  forms  of  the  leaves,  hut  that, 
through  eac*h  interstice,  the  light  falls,  at  a  little  distance,  in  the  form 
of  a  round  or  oval  spot ;  that  is  to  say,  it  produces  the  image  of  the  sun 
itself,  cast  either  vertically  or  obliquely,  in  circle  or  ellipse  according  to 
the  slope  of  the  ground.  Of  course  the  sun's  rays  produce  the  same 
effect,  when  they  fall  through  any  small  aperture  :  but  the  openings  be- 
tween leaves  are  the  only  ones  likely  to  show  it  to  an  ordinary  observer, 
or  to  attract  his  attention  to  it  by  its  frequency,  and  lead  him  to  think 
what  this  type  may  signify  respecting  the  greater  Sun  ;  and  how  it  may 
show  us  that,  even  when  the  opening  through  which  the  earth  receives 
light  is  too  small  to  let  us  see  the  Sun  himself,  the  ray  of  light  that 
enter*,  ii  it  comes  straight  from  Him,  will  still  bear  with  it  His  image* 


ON  COLOUR  AND  COMPOSITION. 


381 


♦tences,  but  in  fair  green  and  shadowy  shapes  of  waving  words, 
and  blossomed  brightness  of  odoriferous  wit,  and  sweet  whis- 
pers of  unintrusive  wisdom,  and  playful  morality. 

Well,  I  am  sorry  myself  to  leave  the  wood,  whatever  my 
reader  may  be  ;  but  leave  it  we  must,  or  we  shall  compose  no 
more  pictures  to-day. 

This  law  of  radiation,  then,  enforcing  unison  of  action  in 
arising  from,  or  proceeding  to,  some  given  point,  is  perhaps, 
of  all  principles  of  composition,  the  most  influential  in  pro- 
ducing the  beauty  of  groups  of  form.  Other  laws  make  them 
forcible  or  interesting,  but  this  generally  is  chief  in  rendering 
them  beautiful.  In  the  arrangement  of  masses  in  pictures,  it 
is  constantly  obeyed  by  the  great  composers  ;  but,  like  the 
law  of  principality,  with  careful  concealment  of  its  imperative- 
ness, the  point  to  which  the  lines  of  main  curvature  are 
directed  being  very  often  far  away  out  of  the  picture.  Some- 
times, however,  a  system  of  curves  will  be  employed  definitely 
to  exalt,  by  their  concurrence,  the  value  of  some  leading  ob- 
ject, and  then  the  law  becomes  traceable  enough. 

In  the  instance  before  us,  the  principal  object  being,  as  we 
have  seen,  the  tower  on  the  bridge,  Turner  has  determined 
that  his  system  of  curvature  should  have  its  origin  in  the  top 
of  this  tower.  The  diagram  Fig.  34.  page  369,  compared  with 
Fig.  32.  page  361,  will  show  how  this  is  done.  One  curve  joins 
the  two  towers,  and  is  continued  by  the  back  of  the  figure 
sitting  on  the  bank  into  the  piece  of  bent  timber.  This  is  a 
limiting  curve  of  great  importance,  and  Turner  has  drawn  a 
considerable  part  of  it  with  the  edge  of  the  timber  very  care- 
fully, and  then  led  the  eye  v^>  to  the  sitting  girl  by  some  white 
spots  and  indications  of  a  ledge  in  the  bank  ;  then  the  passage 
to  the  tops  of  the  towers  cannot  be  missed. 

The  next  curve  is  begun  and  drawn  carefully  for  half  an 
inch  of  its  course  by  the  rudder ;  it  is  then  taken  up  by  the 
basket  and  the  heads  of  the  figures,  and  leads  accurately  to  the 
tower  angle.  The  gunwales  of  both  the  boats  begin  the  next 
two  curves,  which  meet  in  the  same  point ;  and  all  are  cen- 
tralised by  the  long  reflection  which  continues  the  vertical  lines. 

Subordinated  to  this  first  system  of  curves  there  is  another, 


382 


THE  ELEMENTS  OF  DRAWING. 


begun  by  the  small  crossing  bar  of  wood  inserted  in  the  angle 
behind  the  rudder  ;  continued  by  the  bottom  of  the  bank  on 
which  the  figure  sits,  interrupted  forcibly  beyond  it,*  but 
taken  up  again  by  the  water-line  leading  to  the  bridge  foot, 
and  passing  on  in  delicate  shadows  under  the  arches,  not 
easily  shown  in  so  rude  a  diagram,  towards  the  other  ex- 
tremity of  the  bridge.  This  is  a  most  important  curve,  in- 
dicating that  the  force  and  sweep  of  the  river  have  indeed 
been  in  old  times  under  the  large  arches  ;  while  the  antiquity 
of  the  bridge  is  told  us  by  the  long  tongue  of  land,  either  of 
carted  rubbish,  or  washed  down  by  some  minor  stream,  which 
has  interrupted  this  curve,  and  is  now  used  as  a  landing-place 
for  the  boats,  and  for  embarkation  of  merchandise,  of  which 
some  bales  and  bundles  are  laid  in  a  heap,  immediately 
beneath  the  great  tower.  A  common  composer  would  have 
put  these  bales  to  one  side  or  the  other,  but  Turner  knows 
better ;  he  uses  them  as  a  foundation  for  his  tower,  adding  to 
its  importance  precisely  as  the  sculptured  base  adorns  a  pil- 
lar ;  and  he  farther  increases  the  aspect  of  its  height  by  throw- 
ing the  reflection  of  it  far  down  in  the  nearer  water.  All  the 
great  composers  have  this  same  feeling  about  sustaining  their 
vertical  masses  :  you  will  constantly  find  Prout  using  the 
artifice  most  dexterously  (see,  for  instance,  the  figure  with  the 
wheelbarrow  under  the  great  tower,  in  the  sketch  of  St. 
Nicolas,  at  Prague,  and  the  white  group  of  figures  under  the 
tower  in  the  sketch  of  Augsburg  ;  and  Veronese,  Titian,  and 
Tintoret  continually  put  their  principal  figures  at  bases  of 
pillars.  Turner  found  out  their  secret  very  early,  the  most 
prominent  instance  of  his  composition  on  this  principle  being 
the  drawing  of  Turin  from  the  Superga,  in  Hake  well's  Italy. 

*  In  the  smaller  figure  (32.),  it  will  be  seen  that  this  interruption  is 
caused  by  a  cart  coming  down  to  the  water's  edge  ;  and  this  object  is 
serviceable  as  beginning  another  system  of  curves  leading  out  of  the 
picture  on  the  right,  but  so  obscurely  drawn  as  not  to  be  easily  repre- 
sented in  outline.  As  it  is  unnecessary  to  the  explanation  of  our  point 
here,  it  has  been  omitted  in  the  larger  diagram,  the  direction  of  the 
curve  it  begins  being  indicated  by  the  dashes  only. 

%  Both  in  the  Sketches  in  Flanders  and  Germany. 


ON  COLOUR  AND  COMPOSITION. 


383 


I  chose  Fig.  20.,  already  given  to  illustrate  foliage  drawing, 
chiefly  because,  being  another  instance  of  precisely  the  same 
arrangement,  it  will  serve  to  convince  you  of  its  being  inten- 
tional. There,  the  vertical,  formed  by  the  larger  tree,  is  con- 
tinued by  the  figure  of  the  farmer,  and  that  of  one  of  the 
smaller  trees  by  his  stick.  The  lines  of  the  interior  mass  of 
the  bushes  radiate,  under  the  law  of  radiation,  from  a  point 
behind  the  farmer  s  head  ;  but  their  outline  curves  are  carried 
on  and  repeated,  under  the  law  of  continuity,  by  the  curves  of 
the  dog  and  boy — by  the  way,  note  the  remarkable  instance 
in  these  of  the  use  of  darkest  lines  towards  the  light ; — all 
more  or  less  guiding  the  eye  up  to  the  right,  in  order  to  bring 
it  finally  to  the  Keep  of  Windsor,  which  is  the  central  object 
of  the  picture,  as  the  bridge  tower  is  in  the  Goblentz.  The 
wall  on  which  the  boy  climbs  answers  the  purpose  of  contrast- 
ing, both  in  direction  and  character,  with  these  greater 
curves  ;  thus  corresponding  as  nearly  as  possible  to  the  minor 
tongue  of  land  in  the  Coblentz.  This,  however,  introduces  us 
to  another  law,  which  we  must  consider  separately. 

6.    THE  LAV/  OF  CONTRAST. 

Of  course  the  character  of  everything  is  best  manifested  by 
Contrast.  Rest  can  only  be  enjoyed  after  labour  ;  sound,  to 
be  heard  clearly,  must  rise  out  of  silence  ;  light  is  exhibited 
by  darkness,  darkness  by  light ;  and  so  on  in  all  things.  Now 
in  art  every  colour  has  an  opponent  colour,  which,  if  brought 
near  it,  will  relieve  it  more  completely  than  any  other ;  so, 
also,  every  form  and  line  may  be  made  more  striking  to  the 
eye  by  an  opponent  form  or  line  near  them  ;  a  curved  line  is 
set  off  by  a  straight  one,  a  massy  form  by  a  slight  one,  and  so 
on  ;  and  in  all  good  work  nearly  double  the  value,  which  any 
given  colour  or  form  would  have  uncombined,  is  given  to  each 
by  contrast.* 

*  If  you  happen  to  meet  with  the  plate  of  Durer's  representing  a  coat 
of  arms  with  a  skuil  in  the  shield,  note  the  value  given  to  the  concave 
curves  and  sharp  point  of  the  helmet  by  the  convex  leafage  carried 
round  it  in  front ;  and  the  use  of  the  blank  white  part  of  the  shield  in 
©pposing  the  rich  folds  of  the  dress. 


384 


THE  ELEMENTS  OF  BliA  WING. 


In  this  case  again,  however,  a  too  manifest  use  of  the  arti- 
fice vulgarises  a  picture.  Great  painters  do  not  commonly, 
or  very  visibly,  admit  violent  contrast.  They  introduce  it  by 
stealth  and  with  intermediate  links  of  tender  change  ;  allow- 
ing, indeed,  the  opposition  to  tell  upon  the  mind  as  a  surprise, 
but  not  as  a  shock.  * 

Thus  in  the  rock  of  Ehrenbreitstein,  Fig.  35. ,  the  main  cur- 
rent of  the  lines  being  downwards,  in  a  convex  swell,  they  are 
suddenly  stopped  at  the  lowest  tower  by  a  counter  series  of 
beds,  directed  nearly  straight  across  them.  This  adverse  force 
sets  off  and  relieves  the  great  curvature,  but  it  is  reconciled  to 
it  by  a  series  of  radiating  lines  below,  which  at  first  sympa- 
thize with  the  oblique  bar,  then  gradually  get  steeper,  till  they 
meet  and  join  in  the  fall  of  the  great  curve.  No  passage, 
however  intentionally  monotonous,  is  ever  introduced  by  a 
good  artist  without  some  slight  counter  current  of  this  kind  ; 
so  much,  indeed,  do  the  great  composers  feel  the  necessity  of 
it,  that  they  will  even  do  things  purposely  ill  or  unsatisfact- 
orily, in  order  to  give  greater  value  to  their  well-doing  in  other 
places.  In  a  skilful  poet's  versification  the  so-called  bad  or 
inferior  lines  are  not  inferior  because  he  could  not  do  them 
better,  but  because  he  feels  that  if  all  were  equally  weighty, 
there  would  be  no  real  sense  of  weight  anywhere  ;  if  all  were 
equally  melodious,  the  melody  .itself  would  be  fatiguing ;  and 
he  purposely  introduces  the  labouring  or  discordant  verse, 
that  the  full  ring  may  be  felt  in  his  main  sentence,  and  the 
finished  sweetness  in  his  chosen  rhythm.f  And  continually  in 
painting,  inferior  artists  destroy  their  work  by  giving  too  much 

*  Turner  hardly  ever,  as  far  as  I  remember,  allows  a  strong  light  to 
oppose  a  full  dark,  without  some  intervening  tint.  His  suns  never  set 
behind  dark  mountains  without  a  film  of  cloud  above  the  mountain's 
edge. 

f  "  A  prudent  chief  not  always  must  display 
His  powers  in  equal  ranks  and  fair  array, 
But  with  the  occasion  and  the  place  comply, 
Conceal  his  force  ;  nay,  seem  sometimes  to  fly. 
Those  oft  are  stratagems  which  errors  seem, 
Nor  is  it  Homer  nods,  but  we  that  dream. " 

Essay  on  Criticism. 


ON  COLOUR  AND  COMPOSITION. 


385 


of  all  that  they  think  is  good,  while  the  great  painter  gives 
just  enough  to  be  enjoyed,  and  passes  to  an  opposite  kind  of 
enjoyment,  or  to  an  inferior  slate  of  enjoyment:  he  gives  a 
passage  of  rich,  involved,  exquisitely  wrought  colour,  then 
passes  away  into  slight,  and  pale  and  simple  colour  ;  he  paints 
for  a  minute  or  two  with  intense  decision,  then  suddenly  be- 
comes, as  the  spectator  thinks,  slovenly;  but  he  is  not  slovenly: 
you  could  not  have  taken  any  more  decision  from  him  just 
then  ;  you  have  had  as  much  as  is  good  for  you  ;  he  paints 
over  a  great  space  of  his  picture  forms  of  the  most  rounded 
and  melting  tenderness,  and  suddenly,  as  you  think  by  a  freak, 


gives  you  a  bit  as  jagged  and  sharp  as  a  leafless  blackthorn. 
Perhaps  the  most  exquisite  piece  of  subtle  contrast  in  the  wrorld 
of  painting  is  the  arrow  point,  laid  sharp  against  the  white 
side  and  among  the  flowing  hair  of  Correggio's  Antiope.  It  is 
quite  singular  how  very  little  contrast  will  sometimes  serve  to 
make  an  entire  group  of  forms  interesting  which  would  other- 
wise have  been  valueless.  There  is  a  good  deal  of  picturesque 
material,  for  instance,  in  this  top  of  an  old  tower,  Fig.  48., 
tiles  and  stones  and  sloping  roof  not  disagreeably  mingled  ; 
but. all  would  have  been  unsatisfactory  if  there  had  not  hap- 
pened to  be  that  iron  ring  on  the  inner  wail,  which  by  its 


Fig.  48. 


386 


THE  ELEMENTS  OF  DRAWING. 


vigorous,  black  circular  line  precisely  opposes  all  the  square 
and  angular  characters  of  the  battlements  and  roof.  Draw 
the  tower  without  the  ring,  and  see  what  a  difference  it  will 
make. 

One  of  the  most  importent  applications  of  the  law  of  con- 
trast is  in  association  with  the  law  of  continuity,  causing  an 
unexpected  but  gentle  break  in  a  continuous  series.  This 
artifice  is  perpetual  in  music,  and  perpetual  also  in  good  illu- 
mination ;  the  way  in  which  little  surprises  of  change  are  pre- 
pared in  any  current  borders,  or  chains  of  ornamental  design, 
being  one  of  the  most  subtle  characteristics  of  the  work  of 
the  good  periods.  We  take,  for  instance,  a  bar  of  ornament 
between  two  written  columns  of  an  early  14th  century  MS., 
and  at  the  first  glance  we  suppose  it  to  be  quite  monotonous 
all  the  way  up,  composed  of  a  winding  tendril,  with  alter- 
nately a  blue  leaf  and  a  scarlet  bud.  Presently,  however,  we 
see  that,  in  order  to  observe  the  law  of  principality  there  is 
one  large  scarlet  leaf  instead  of  a  bud,  nearly  half-way  up,  which 
forms  a  centre  to  the  whole  rod  ;  and  when  we  begin  to  ex- 
amine the  order  of  the  leaves,  we  find  it  varied  carefully.  Let 
a  stand  for  scarlet  bud,  b  for  blue  leaf,  c  for  two  blue  leaves 
on  one  stalk,  s  for  a  stalk  without  a  leaf,  and  r  for  the  large 
red  leaf.  Then  counting  from  the  ground,  the  order  begins 
as  follows : 

b,  b,  a  ;  b,  s,  b,  a  ;  b,  b,  a  ;  b,  b,  a  ;  and  we  think  we  shall  have 
two  b's  and  an  a  all  the  way,  when  suddenly  it  becomes  b,  a; 

b,  r  ;  6,  a  ;  b,  a  ;  b,  a  ;  and  we  think  we  are  going  to  have  b,  a 
continued  ;  but  no  :  here  it  becomes  b,  s  ;  b,  s  ;  b,  a  ;  b,  s ;  b,  s; 

c,  h  ;  b,  s  ;  b,  s ;  and  we  think  we  are  surely  going  to  have  b,  s 
continued,  but  behold  it  runs  away  to  the  end  with  a  quick  b,  b, 
a  ;  b,  b,  b,  b  !  *  Very  often,  however,  the  designer  is  satisfied 
with  one  surprise,  but  I  never  saw  a  good  illuminated  border 
without  one  at  least ;  and  no  series  of  any  kind  is  ever  intro- 
duced by  a  great  composer  in  a  painting  without  a  snap  some- 
where. There  is  a  pretty  one  in  Turner's  drawing  of  Eome, 
with  the  large  balustrade  for  a  foreground  in  the  Hakewell's 

*  I  am  describing  from  a  MS.,  circa  1300,  of  Gregory's  k ' Decretalia M 
in  my  own  possession. 


ON  COLOUR  AND  COMPOSITION. 


387 


Italy  series :  the  single  baluster  struck  out  of  the  line,  and 
showing  the  street  below  through  the  gap,  simply  makes  the 
whole  composition  right,  when  otherwise,  it  would  have  been 
stiff  and  absurd. 

If  you  look  back  to  Fig.  48.  you  will  see,  in  the  arrange- 
ment of  the  battlements,  a  simple  instance  of  the  use  of  such 
variation.  The  whole  top  of  the  tower,  though  actually  three 
sides  of  a  square,  strikes  the  eye  as  a  continuous  series  of  five 
masses.  The  first  two,  on  the  left,  somewhat  square  and 
blank  ;  then  the  next  two  higher  and  richer,  the  tiles  being 
seen  on  their  slopes.  Both  these  groups  being  couples,  there 
is  enough  monotony  in  the  series  to  make  a  change  pleasant  ; 
and  the  last  battlement,  therefore,  is  a  little  higher  than  the 
first  two, — a  little  lower  than  the  second  two, — and  different 
in  shape  from  either.  Hide  it  with  your  finger,  and  see  how 
ugly  and  formal  the  other  four  battlements  look. 

There  a**e  in  this  figure  several  other  simple  illustrations  of 
the  laws  we  have  been  tracing.  Thus  the  whole  shape  of  the 
wall's  mas?  being  square,  it  is  well,  still  for  the  sake  of  con- 
trast, to  oppose  it  not  only  by  the  element  of  curvature,  in  the 
ring,  and  lines  of  the  roof  below,  but  by  that  of  sharpness ; 
hence  the  pleasure  which  the  eye  takes  in  the  projecting  point 
of  the  roof.  Also  because  the  walls  are  thick  and  sturdy,  it  is 
wrell  to  contrast  their  strength  with  weakness ;  therefore  we 
enjoy  the  evident  decrepitude  of  this  roof  as  it  sinks  between 
them.  The  whole  mass  being  nearly  white,  we  want  a  con- 
trasting shadow  somewhere  ;  and  get  it,  under  our  piece  of 
decrepitude.  This  shade,  with  the  tiles  of  the  wall  below, 
forms  mother  pointed  mass,  necessary  to  the  first  by  the  law 
of  repetition.  Hide  this  inferior  angle  with  your  finger,  and 
see  how  ugly  the  other  looks.  A  sense  of  the  law  of  sym- 
metry, though  you  might  hardly  suppose  it,  has  some  share  in 
the  feeling  with  which  you  look  at  the  battlements  ;  there  is 
a  certain  pleasure  in  the  opposed  slopes  of  their  top,  on  one 
side  down  to  the  left,  on  the  other  to  the  right.  Still  less 
would  you  think  the  law  of  radiation  had  anything  to  do  with 
the  matter  :  but  if  you  take  the  extreme  point  of  the  black 
shadow  on  the  left  for  a  centre  and  follow  first  the  low  curve 


388 


THE  ELEMENTS  OF  DRAWING. 


of  the  eaves  of  the  wall,  it  will  lead  yon,  if  you  continue  it,  to 
the  point  of  the  tower  cornice  ;  follow  the  second  curve,  the 
top  of  the  tiles  of  the  wall,  and  it  will  strike  the  top  of  the 
right-hand  battlement  ;  then  draw  a  curve  from  the  highest 
point  of  the  angle  battlement  on  the  left,  through  the  points 
of  the  roof  and  its  dark  echo  ;  and  you  will  see  how  the  whole 
top  of  the  tower  radiates  from  this  lowest  dark  point.  There 
are  other  curvatures  crossing  these  main  ones,  to  keep  them 
from  being  too  conspicuous.  Follow  the  curve  of  the  upper 
roof,  it  will  take  you  to  the  top  of  the  highest  battlement ;  and 
the  stones  indicated  at  the  right-hand  side  of  the  tower  are 
more  extended  at  the  bottom,  in  order  to  get  some  less  direct 
expression  of  sympathy,  such  as  irregular  stones  may  be  cap- 
able of,  with  the  general  flow  of  the  curves  from  left  to  right. 

You  may  not  readily  believe,  at  first,  that  all  these  laws  are 
indeed  involved  in  so  trifling  a  piece  of  composition.  But  as 
you  study  longer,  you  will  discover  that  these  laws,  and  many 
more,  are  obeyed  by  the  powerful  composers  in  every  touch : 
that  literally,  there  is  never  a  dash  of  their  pencil  which  is 
not  carrying  out  appointed  purposes  of  this  kind  in  twenty 
various  ways  at  once  ;  and  that  there  is  as  much  difference,  in 
way  of  intention  and  authority,  between  one  of  the  great  com- 
posers ruling  his  colours,  and  a  common  painter  confused  by 
them,  as  there  is  between  a  general  directing  the  march  of  an 
army,  and  an  old  lady  carried  off  her  feet  by  a  mob. 

7.  THE  LAW  OF  INTERCHANGE. 

Closely  connected  with  the  law  of  contrast  is  a  law  which 
enforces  the  unity  of  opposite  things,  by  giving  to  each  a 
portion  of  the  character  of  the  other.  If,  for  instance,  you 
divide  a  shield  into  two  masses  of  colour,  all  the  way  down- 
suppose  blue  and  white,  and  put  a  bar,  or  figure  of  an  animal, 
partly  on  one  division,  partly  on  the  other,  you  will  find  it 
pleasant  to  the  eye  if  you  make  the  part  of  the  animal  blue 
which  comes  upon  the  white  half,  and  white  which  comes 
upon  the  blue  half.  This  is  done  in  heraldry,  partly  for  the 
sake  of  perfect  intelligibility,  but  yet  more  for  the  sake  of  de- 
light in  interchange  of  colour,  since,  in  all  ornamentation 


ON  COLOUR  AND  COMPOSITION. 


389 


whatever,  the  practice  is  continual,  in  the  ages  of  good  de- 
sign. 

Sometimes  this  alternation  is  merely  a  reversal  of  contrasts  ; 
as  that,  after  red  has  been  for  some  time  on  one  side,  and 
blue  on  the  other,  red  shall  pass  to  blue's  side  and  blue  to 
red's.  This  kind  of  alternation  takes  place  simply  in  four- 
quartered  shields  ;  in  more  subtle  pieces  of  treatment,  a  little 
bit  only  of  each  colour  is  carried  into  the  other,  and  they  are 
as  it  were  dovetailed  together.  One  of  the  most  curious  facts 
which  will  impress  itself  upon  you,  when  you  have  drawn  some 
time  carefully  from  Nature  in  light  and  shade,  is  the  appear- 
ance of  intentional  artifice  with  which  contrasts  of  this  alter- 
nate kind  are  produced  by  her  ;  the  artistry  with  which  she 
will  darken  a  tree  trunk  as  long  as  it  comes  against  light  sky, 
and  throw  sunlight  on  it  precisely  at  the  spot  where  it  comes 
against  a  dark  hill,  and  similarly  treat  all  her  masses  of  shade 
and  colour,  is  so  great,  that  if  you  only  follow  her  closely, 
every  one  who  looks  at  your  drawing  with  attention  will 
think  that  }tou  have  been  inventing  the  most  artifically  and 
unnaturally  delightful  interchanges  of  shadow  that  could  pos- 
sibly be  devised  by  human  wit. 

You  will  find  this  law  of  interchange  insisted  upon  at  length 
by  Prout  in  his  "Lessons  on  Light  and  Shade  :"  it  seems,  of 
all  his  principles  of  composition,  to  be  the  one  he  is  most  con- 
scious of ;  many  others  he  obeys  by  instinct,  but  this  he  for- 
mally accepts  and  forcibly  declares. 

The  typical  purpose  of  the  lav/  of  interchange  is,  of  course, 
to  teach  us  how  opposite  natures  may  be  helped  and  strength- 
ened by  receiving  each,  as  far  as  they  can,  some  impress  or 
imparted  power,  from  the  other. 

8.   THE  LAW  OF  CONSISTENCY. 

It  is  to  be  remembered,  in  the  next  place,  that  while  con- 
trast exhibits  the  characters  of  things,  it  very  often  neutralises 
or  paralyses  their  power.  A  number  of  white  things  may  be 
shown  to  be  clearly  white  by  opposition  of  a  black  thing,  but 
if  you  want  the  full  power  of  their  gathered  light,  the  black 
thing  may  be  seriously  in  our  way.     Thus,  while  contrast 


390 


THE  ELEMENTS  OF  BRA  WING. 


displays  things,  it  is  unity  and  sympathy  which  employ  them, 
concentrating  the  power  of  several  into  a  mass.  And,  not  in 
art  merely,  but  in  all  the  affairs  of  life,  the  wisdom  of  man  is 
continually  called  upon  to  reconcile  these  opposite  methods  of 
exhibiting,  or.  using,  the  materials  in  his  power.  By  change 
he  gives  them  pleasantness,  and  by  consistency  value ;  by 
change  he  is  refreshed,  and  by  perseverence  strengthened. 

Hence  many  compositions  address  themselves  to  the  specta- 
tor by  aggregate  force  of  colour  or  line,  more  than  by  contrasts 
of  either  ;  many  noble  pictures  are  painted  almost  exclu- 
sively in  various  tones  of  red,  or  grey,  or  gold,  so  as  to  be  in- 
stantly striking  by  their  breadth  of  flush,  or  glow,  or  tender 
coldness,  these  qualities  being  exhibited  only  by  slight  and 
subtle  use  of  contrast.  Similarly  as  to  form  ;  some  composi- 
tions associate  massive  and  rugged  forms,  others  slight  and 
graceful  ones,  each  with  few  interruptions  by  lines  of  con^ 
trary  character.  And,  in  general,  such  compositions  possess 
higher  sublimity  than  those  which  are  more  mingled  in  their 
elements.  They  tell  a  special  tale,  and  summon  a  definite 
state  of  feeling,  while  the  grand  compositions  merely  please 
the  eye. 

This  unity  or  breadth  of  character  generally  attaches  most 
to  the  works  of  the  greatest  men  ;  their  separate  pictures 
have  all  separate  aims.  We  have  not,  in  each,  grey  colour  set 
against  sombre,  and  sharp  forms  against  soft,  and  loud  passages 
against  low  ;  but  we  have  the  bright  picture,  with  its  delicate 
sadness  ;  the  sombre  picture,  with  its  single  ray  of  relief  ;  the 
stern  picture,  with  only  one  tender  group  of  lines  ;  the  soft 
and  calm  picture,  with  only  one  rock  angle  at  its  flank ;  and 
so  on.  Hence  the  variety  of  their  work,  as  well  as  its  im- 
pressiveness.  The  principal  bearing  of  this  law,  however,  is 
on  the  separate  masses  or  divisions  of  a  picture :  the  charac- 
ter of  the  whole  composition  may  be  broken  or  various,  if  we 
please,  but  there  must  certainly  be  a  tendency  to  consistent 
assemblage  in  its  divisions.  As  an  army  may  act  on  several 
points  at  once,  but  can  only  act  effectually  by  having  some- 
where formed  and  regular  masses,  and  not  wholly  by  skir- 
mishers ;  so  a  picture  may  be  various  in  its  tendencies,  but 


ON  COLOUR  AND  COMPOSITION. 


391 


must  be  somewhere  united  and  coherent  in  its  masses.  Good 
composers  are  always  associating  their  colours  in  great 
groups  ;  binding  their  forms  together  by  encompassing  lines, 
and  securing,  by  various  dexterities  of  expedient,  what  they 
themselves  call  "  breadth  :  "  that  is  to  say,  a  large  gathering 
of  each  kind  of  thing  into  one  place  ;  light  being  gathered  to 
light,  darkness  to  darkness,  and  colour  to  colour.  If,  how- 
ever, this  be  done  by  introducing  false  lights  or  false  col- 
ours, it  is  absurd  and  monstrous  ;  the  skill  of  a  painter  con- 
sists in  obtaining  breadth  by  rational  arrangement  of  his 
objects,  not  by  forced  or  wanton  treatment  of  them.  It  is  an 
easy  matter  to  paint  one  thing  all  white,  and  another  all  black 
or  brown  ;  but  not  an  easy  matter  to  assemble  all  the  circum- 
stances which  will  naturally  produce  white  in  one  place,  and 
brown  in  another.  Generally  speaking,  howTever,  breadth  will 
result  in  sufficient  degree  from  fidelity  of  study :  Nature  is 
always  broad  ;  and  if  you  paint  her  colours  in  true  relations, 
you  will  paint  them  in  majestic  masses.  If  you  find  your 
work  look  broken  and  scattered,  it  is,  in  all  probability,  not 
only  ill  composed,  but  untrue. 

The  opposite  quality  to  breadth,  that  of  division  or  scatter- 
ing of  light  and  colour,  has  a  certain  contrasting  charm,  and 
is  occasionally  introduced  with  exquisite  effect  by  good  com- 
posers.* Still,  it  is  never  the  mere  scattering,  but  the 
order  discernible  through  this  scattering,  which  is  the  real 
source  of  pleasure  ;  not  the  mere  multitude,  but  the  con- 
stellation of  multitude.  The  broken  lights  in  the  work  of  a 
good  painter  wander  like  flocks  upon  the  hills,  not  unshep- 
herded ;  speaking  of  life  and  peace :  the  broken  lights  of  a 
bad  painter  fall  like  hailstones,  and  are  capable  only  of  mis- 
chief, leaving  it  to  be  wished  they  were  also  of  dissolution. 

*  One  of  the  most  wonderful  compositions  of  Tintoret  in  Venice,  is 
little  more  than  a  field  of  subdued  crimson,  spotted  with  flakes  of  scat- 
tered gold.  The  upper  clouds  in  the  most  beautiful  skies  owe  great  part 
of  their  power  to  infinitude  of  division  ;  order  being  marked  through 
this  division. 


392 


THE  ELEMENTS  OF  DRAWING. 


9.    THE  LAW  OF  HAKMONY. 

This  last  law  is  not,  strictly  speaking,  so  much  one  of  com- 
position as  of  truth,  but  it  must  guide  composition,  and  is 
properly,  therefore,  to  be  stated  in  this  place. 

Good  drawing  is,  as  we  have  seen,  an  abstract  of  natural 
facts  ;  you  cannot  represent  all  that  you  would,  but  must 
continually  be  falling  short,  whether  you  will  or  no,  of  the 
force,  or  quantity,  of  Nature.  Now,  suppose  that  your  means 
and  time  do  not  admit  of  your  giving  the  depth  of  colour  in 
the  scene,  and  that  you  are  obliged  to  paint  it  paler.  If  you 
paint  all  the  colours  proportionately  paler,  as  if  an  equal 
quantity  of  tint  had  been  washed  away  from  each  of  them, 
you  still  obtain  a  harmonious,  though  not  an  equally  forcible 
statement  of  natural  fact.  But  if  you  take  away  the  colours 
unequally,  and  leave  some  tints  nearly  as  deep  as  they  are  in 
Nature,  while  others  are  much  subdued,  you  have  no  longer 
a  true  statement.  You  cannot  say  to  the  observer,  "  Fancy 
all  those  colours  a  little  deeper,  and  you  will  have  the  actual 
fact."  However  he  adds  in  imagination,  or  takes  away,  some- 
thing is  sure  to  be  still  wrong.  The  picture  is  out  of  har- 
mony. 

It  will  happen,  however,  much  more  frequently,  that  you 
have  to  darken  the  whole  system  of  colours,  than  to  make 
them  paler.  You  remember,  in  your  first  studies  of  colour 
from  Nature,  you  were  to  leave  the  passages  of  light  which 
were  too  bright  to  be  imitated,  as  white  paper.  But,  in  com- 
pleting the  picture,  it  becomes  necessary  to  put  colour  into 
them  ;  and  then  the  other  colours  must  be  made  darker,  in 
some  fixed  relation  to  them.  If  you  deepen  all  proportion- 
ately, though  the  whole  scene  is  darker  than  reality,  it  is  only 
as  if  you  were  looking  at  the  reality  in  a  lower  light  :  but  if, 
while  you  darken  some  of  the  tints,  you  leave  others  undark- 
ened,  the  picture  is  out  of  harmony,  and  will  not  give  the  im- 
pression of  truth. 

It  is  not,  indeed,  possible  to  deepen  all  the  colours  so  much 
as  to  relieve  the  lights  in  their  natural  degree ;  you  would 
merely  sink  most  of  your  colours,  if  you  tried  to  do  so,  into  a 


ON  COLOUR  AND  COMPOSITION. 


393 


broad  mass  of  blackness  :  but  it  is  quite  possible  to  lower 
them  harmoniously,  and  yet  more  in  some  parts  of  the  pict- 
ure than  in  others,  so  as  to  allow  you  to  show  the  light  you 
want  in  a  visible  relief.  In  well-harmonised  pictures  this  is 
done  by  gradually  deepening  the  tone  of  the  picture  towards 
the  lighter  parts  of  it,  without  materially  lowering  it  in  the 
very  dark  parts  ;  the  tendency  in  such  pictures  being,  of 
course,  to  include  large  masses  of  middle  tints.  But  the 
principal  point  to  be  observed  in  doing  this,  is  to  deepen 
the  individual  tints  without  dirtying  or  obscuring  them.  It 
is  easy  to  lower  the  tone  of  the  picture  by  washing  it  over 
with  grey  or  brown  ;  and  easy  to  see  the  effect  of  the  land- 
scape, when  its  colours  are  thus  universally  polluted  with 
black,  by  using  the  black  convex  mirror,  one  of  the  most 
pestilent  inventions  for  falsifying  nature  and  degrading  art 
which  ever  was  put  into  an  artist's  hand.*  For  the  thing  re- 
quired is  not  to  darken  pale  yellow  by  mixing  grey  with  it, 
but  to  deepen  the  pure  yellow ;  not  to  darken  crimson  by 
mixing  black  with  it,  but  by  making  it  deeper  and  richer  crim- 
son :  and  thus  the  required  effect  could  only  be  seen  in  Nat- 
ure, if  you  had  pieces  of  glass  of  the  colour  of  every  object 
in  your  landscape,  and  of  every  minor  hue  that  made  up  those 
colours,  and  then  could  see  the  real  landscape  through  this 
deep  gorgeousness  of  the  varied  glass.  You  cannot  do  this 
with  glass,  but  you  can  do  it  for  yourself  as  you  work  ;  that 
is  to  say,  you  can  put  deep  blue  for  pale  blue,  deep  gold  for 
pale  gold,  and  so  on,  in  the  proportion  you  need ;  and  then 
you  may  paint  as  forcibly  as  you  choose,  but  your  work  will 
still  be  in  the  manner  of  Titian,  not  of  Caravaggio  or  Spagno- 
letto,  or  any  other  of  the  black  slaves  of  painting."}* 

*  I  fully  believe  that  the  strange  grey  gloom,  accompanied  by  consid- 
erable power  of  effect,  which  prevails  in  modern  French  art  must  be 
owing  to  the  use  of  this  mischievous  instrument ;  the  French  landscape 
always  gives  me  the  idea  of  Nature  seen  carelessly  in  the  dark  mirror, 
and  painted  coarsely,  but  scientifically,  through  the  veil  of  its  pervpr- 
sion. 

*  Various  other  parts  of  this  subject  are  entered  into,  especially  in 
their  bearing  on  the  idual  of  painting,  in  "Modern  Painters,"  vol.  ivv 
chap.  iii. 


394 


THE  ELEMENTS  OF  DRAWING. 


Supposing  those  scales  of  colour,  which  I  told  you  to  pre- 
pare in  order  to  show  you  the  relations  of  colour  to  grey,  were 
quite  accurately  made,  and  numerous  enough,  you  would  have 
nothing  more  to  do,  in  order  to  obtain  a  deeper  tone  in  any 
given  mass  of  colour,  than  to  substitute  for  each  of  its  hues 
the  hue  as  many  degrees  deeper  in  the  scale  as  you  wanted, 
that  is  to  say,  if  you  want  to  deepen  the  whole  two  degrees, 
substituting  for  the  yellow  No.  5.  the  yellow  No.  7.,  and  for 
the  red  No.  9.  the  red  No.  11.,  and  so  on;  but  the  hues  of 
any  object  in  Nature  are  far  too  numerous,  and  their  degrees 
too  subtle,  to  admit  of  so  mechanical  a  process.  Still,  you 
may  see  the  principle  of  the  whole  matter  clearly  by  taking  a 
group  of  colours  out  of  your  scale,  arranging  them  prettify, 
and  then  washing  them  all  over  with  grey  :  that  represents 
the  treatment  of  Nature  by  the  black  mirror.  Then  arrange 
the  same  group  of  colours,  with  the  tints  five  or  six  degrees 
deeper  in  the  scale  ;  and  that  will  represent  the  treatment  of 
Nature  by  Titian. 

You  can  only,  however,  feel  your  way  fully  to  the  right  of 
the  thing  by  working  from  Nature. 

The  best  subject  on  which  to  begin  a  piece  of  study  of  this 
kind  is  a  good  thick  tree  trunk,  seen  against  blue  sky  with 
some  white  clouds  in  it.  Paint  the  clouds  in  true  and  ten- 
derly gradated  white  ;  then  give  the  sky  a  bold  full  blue, 
bringing  them  well  out  ;  then  paint  the  trunk  and  leaves 
grandly  dark  against  all,  but  in  such  glowing  dark  green  and 
brown  as  you  see  they  will  bear.  Afterwards  proceed  to 
more  complicated  studies,  matching  the  colours  carefully  first 
by  your  old  method  ;  then  deepening  each  colour  with  its  own 
tint,  and  being  careful,  above  all  things,  to  keep  truth  of  equal 
change  when  the  colours  are  connected  with  each  other,  as  in 
dark  and  light  sides  of  the  same  object.  Much  more  aspect 
and  sense  of  harmony  are  gained  by  the  precision  with  which 
you  observe  the  relation  of  colours  in  dark  sides  and  light 
sides,  and  the  influence  of  modifying  reflections,  than  by  mere 
accuracy  of  added  depth  in  independent  colours. 

This  harmony  of  tone,  as  it  is  generally  called,  is  the  most 
important  of  those  which  the  artist  has  to  regard.    But  there 


ON  COLOUR  AND  COMPOSITION. 


395 


are  all  kinds  of  harmonies  in  a  picture,  according  to  its  mode 
of  production.  There  is  even  a  harmony  of  touch.  If  you 
paint  one  part  of  it  very  rapidly  and  forcibly,  and  another  part 
slowly  and  delicately,  each  division  of  the  picture  may  be  right 
separately,  but  they  will  not  agree  together  :  the  whole  will  be 
effectless  and  valueless,  out  of  harmony.  Similarly,  if  you  paint 
one  part  of  it  by  a  yellow  light  in  a  warm  day,  and  another  by  a 
grey  light  in  a  cold  day,  though  both  may  have  been  sunlight, 
and  both  may  be  well  toned,  and  have  their  relative  shadows 
truly  cast,  neither  will  look  like  light :  they  will  destroy  each 
other's  power,  by  being  out  of  harmony.  These  are  only  broad 
and  definable  instances  of  discordance  ;  but  there  is  an  extent 
of  harmony  in  all  good  work  much  too  subtle  for  definition  ; 
depending  on  the  draughtsman's  carrying  everything  he  draws 
up  to  just  the  balancing  and  harmonious  point,  in  finish,  and 
colour,  and  depth  of  tone,  and  intensity  of  moral  feeling,  and 
style  of  touch,  all  considered  at  once  ;  and  never  allowing  him- 
self to  lean  too  emphatically  on  detached  parts,  or  exalt  one 
thing  at  the  expense  of  another,  or  feel  acutely  in  one  place 
and  coldly  in  another.  If  you  have  got  some  of  Cruikshank's 
etchings,  you  will  be  able,  I  think,  to  feel  the  natuie  of  harmo- 
nious treatment  in  a  simple  kind,  by  comparing  them  with  any 
of  Richter's  illustrations  to  the  numerous  German  story-books 
lately  published  at  Christmas,  with  all  the  German  stories 
spoiled.  Cruikshank's  work  is  often  incomplete  in  character 
and  poor  in  incident,  but,  as  drawing,  it  is  perfect  in  harmony. 
The  pure  and  simple  effects  of  daylight  which  he  gets  by  his 
thorough  mastery  of  treatment  in  this  respect,  are  quite  unri- 
valled, as  far  as  I  know,  by  any  other  work  executed  with  so 
few  touches.  His  vignettes  to  Grimm's  German  stories, 
already  recommended,  are  the  most  remarkable  in  this  quality. 
Richter's  illustrations,  on  the  contrary,  are  of  a  very  high 
stamp  as  respects  understanding  of  human  character,  with  in- 
finite playfulness  and  tenderness  of  fancy  ;  but,  as  drawings, 
they  are  almost  unendurably  out  of  harmony,  violent  blacks  in 
one  place  being  continually  opposed  to  trenchant  white  in 
another  ;  and,  as  is  almost  sure  to  be  the  case  with  bad  har- 
monists, the  local  colour  hardly  felt  anywhere.    All  German 


396 


THE  ELEMENTS  OF  DllA  WING. 


work  is  apt  to  be  out  of  harmony,  in  consequence  of  its  too  fre» 
quent  conditions  of  affectation,  and  its  wilful  refusals  of  fact ; 
as  well  as  b}r  reason  of  a  feverish  kind  of  excitement,  which 
dwells  violently  on  particular  points,  and  makes  all  the  lines  of 
thought  in  the  picture  to  stand  on  end,  as  it  were,  like  a  cat's 
fur  electrified  ;  while  good  work  is  always  as  quiet  as  a  couchant 
leopard,  and  as  strong. 

I  have  now  stated  to  you  all  the  laws  of  composition  which 
occur  to  me  as  capable  of  being  illustrated  or  defined ;  but 
there  are  multitudes  of  others  which,  in  the  present  state  of 
my  knowledge,  I  cannot  define,  and  others  which  I  never 
hope  to  define  ;  and  these  the  most  important,  and  connected 
with  the  deepest  powers  of  the  art.  Among  those  which  I 
hope  to  be  able  to  explain  when  I  have  thought  of  them  more, 
are  the  laws  which  relate  to  nobleness  and  ignobleness  ;  that 
ignobleness  especially  which  wTe  commonly  call  "  vulgarity," 
and  which,  in  its  essence,  is  one  of  the  most  curious  subjects 
of  inquiry  connected  with  human  feeling.  Among  those 
which  I  never  hope  to  explain,  are  chiefly  laws  of  expression, 
and  others  bearing  simply  on  simple  matters  ;  but,  for  that 
very  reason,  more  influential  than  any  others.  These  are, 
from  the  first,  as  inexplicable  as  our  bodily  sensations  are  ;  it 
being  just  as  impossible,  I  think,  to  explain  why  one  succes- 
sion of  musical  notes  *  shall  be  noble  and  pathetic,  and  such 
as  might  have  been  sung  by  Casella  to  Dante,  and  why  an- 
other succession  is  base  and  ridiculous,  and  would  be  fit  only 
for  the  reasonably  good  ear  of  Bottom,  as  to  explain  why  we 
like  sweetness,  and  dislike  bitterness.  The  best  part  of  every 
great  work  is  always  inexplicable :  it  is  good  because  it  is 
good  ;  and  innocently  gracious,  opening  as  the  green  of  the 
earth,  or  falling  as  the  dew  of  heaven. 

But  though  you  cannot  explain  them,  you  may  always  render 

*  In  all  the  best  arrangements  of  colour,  the  delight  occasioned  by 
their  mode  of  succession  is  entirely  inexplicable,  nor  can  it  be  reasoned 
about  ;  we  like  it  just  as  we  like  an  air  in  music,  bufc  cannot  reason  any 
refractory  person  into  liking  it,  if  they  do  not:  and  yet  there  is  dis- 
tinctly a  right  and  a  wrong  in  it,  and  a  good  taste  and  bad  taste  respect 
irig  it,  as  also  in  music. 


ON  COLOUR  AND  COMPOSITION. 


397 


yourself  more  and  more  sensitive  to  these  higher  qualities  by 
the  discipline  which  you  generally  give  to  your  character,  and 
this  especially  with  regard  to  the  choice  of  incidents  ;  a  kind 
of  composition  in  some  sort  easier  than  the  artistical  arrange- 
ments of  lines  and  colours,  but  in  every  sort  nobler,  because 
addressed  to  deeper  feelings. 

For  instance,  in  the  "Datur  Hora  Quieti,"  the  last  vignette 
to  Roger's  Poems,  the  plough  in  the  foreground  has  three  pur- 
poses. The  first  purpose  is  to  meet  the  stream  of  sunlight  on 
the  river,  and  make  it  brighter  by  opposition  ;  but  any  dark 
object  whatever  would  have  done  this.  Its  second  purpose  is 
by  its  two  arms,  to  repeat  the  cadence  of  the  group  of  the  two 
ships,  and  thus  give  a  greater  expression  of  repose  ;  but  two 
sitting  figures  would  have  done  this.  Its  third  and  chief,  or 
pathetic,  purpose  is,  as  it  lies  abandoned  in  the  furrow  (the 
vessels  also  being  moored,  and  having  their  sails  down),  to  be 
a  type  of  human  labour  closed  with  the  close  of  day.  The 
parts  of  it  on  which  the  hand  leans  are  brought  most  clearly 
into  sight ;  and  they  are  the  chief  dark  of  the  picture,  because 
the  tillage  of  the  ground  is  required  of  man  as  a  punishment ; 
but  they  make  the  soft  light  of  the  setting  sun  brighter,  be- 
cause rest  is  sweetest  after  toil.  These  thoughts  may  never 
occur  to  us  as  we  glance  carelessly  at  the  design  ;  and  yet 
their  under  current  assuredly  affects  the  feelings,  and  increases, 
as  the  painter  meant  it  should,  the  impression  of  melancholy, 
and  of  peace. 

Again,  in  the  "  Lancaster  Sands,"  which  is  one  of  the  plates 
I  have  marked  as  most  desirable  for  your  possession  ;  the 
stream  of  light  which  falls  from  the  setting  sun  on  the  ad- 
vancing tide  stands  similarly  in  need  of  some  force  of  near 
object  to  relieve  its  brightness.  But  the  incident  which  Tur 
nor  has  here  adopted  is  the  swoop  of  an  angry  seagull  at  a  dog, 
who  yelps  at  it,  drawing  back  as  the  wave  rises  over  his  feet, 
and  the  bird  shrieks  within  a  foot  of  his  face.  Its  unexpected 
boldness  is  a  type  of  the  anger  of  its  ocean  element,  and  warns 
us  of  the  sea's  advance  just  as  surely  as  the  abandoned  plough 
told  us  of  the  ceased  labour  of  the  day. 

It  is  not,  however,  so  much  in  the  selection  of  single  in* 


398 


THE  ELEMENTS  OF  DBA  WING. 


cidents  of  this  kind  as  in  the  feeling  which  regulates  the  an 
rangement  of  the  whole  subject  that  the  mind  of  a  great  com- 
poser is  known.    A  single  incident  may  be  suggested  by  a 
felicitous  chance,  as  a  pretty  motto  might  be  for  the  heading 
of  a  chapter.    But  the  great  composers  so  arrange  all  their 
designs  that  one  incident  illustrates  another,  just  as  one  colour 
relieves  another.    Perhaps  the  "  Heysham,"  of  the  Yorkshire 
series  which,  as  to  its  locality,  may  be  considered  a  companion 
to  the  last  drawing  we  have  spoken  of,  the  "  Lancaster  Sands," 
presents  as  interesting  an  example  as  we  could  find  of  Turner's 
feeling  in  this  respect.  The  subject  is  a  simple  north-country 
village,  on  the  shore  of-Morecambe  Bay  ;  not  in  the  common 
sense,  a  picturesque  village :  there  are  no  pretty  bow- windows, 
or  red  roofs,  or  rocky  steps  of  entrance  to  the  rustic  doors, 
or  quaint  gables  ;  nothing  but  a  single  street  of  thatched  and 
chiefly  clay-built  cottages,  ranged  in  a  somewhat  monotonous 
line,  the  roofs  so  green  with  moss  that  at  first  we  hardly  dis- 
cern the  houses  from  the  fields  and  trees.    The  village  street 
is  closed  at  the  end  by  a  wooden  gate,  indicating  the  little 
traffic  there  is  on  the  road  through  it,  and  giving  it  something 
the  look  of  a  large  farmstead,  in  which  a  right  of  way  lies 
through  the  yard.    The  road  which  leads  to  this  gate  is  full 
of  ruts,  and  winds  down  a  bad  bit  of  hill  between  two  broken 
banks  of  moor  ground,  succeeding  immediately  to  the  few 
enclosures  which  surround  the  village  ;  they  can  hardly  be 
called  gardens ;  but  a  decayed  fragment  or  two  of  fencing 
fill  the  gaps  in  the  bank  ;  and  a  clothes-line,  with  some 
clothes  on  it,  striped  blue  and  red,  and  a  smock-frock,  is 
stretched  between  the  trunks  of  some  stunted  willows  ;  a  very 
small  haystack  and  pigstye  being  seen  at  the  back  of  the  cot- 
tage beyond.    An  empty,  two-wheeled,  lumbering  cart,  drawn 
by  a  pair  of  horses  with  huge  wooden  collars,  the  driver  sitting 
lazily  in  the  sun,  sideways  on  the  leader,  is  going  slowly  home 
along  the  rough  road,  it  being  about  country  dinner-time, 
At  the  end  of  the  village  there  is  a  better  house,  with  three 
chimneys  and  a  dormer  window  in  its  roof,  and  the  roof  is  of 
stone  shingle  instead  of  thatch,  but  very  rough.    This  house 
is  no  doubt  the  clergyman's  ;  there  is  some  smoke  from  one 


ON  COLOUR  AND  COMPOSITION 


399 


of  its  chimneys,  none  from  any  other  in  the  village  ;  this 
smoke  is  from  the  lowest  chimney  at  the  back,  evidently  that 
of  the  kitchen,  and  it  is  rather  thick,  the  fire  not  having  been 
long  lighted.  A  few  hundred  yards  from  the  clergyman's 
house,  nearer  the  shore,  is  the  church,  discernible  from  the 
cottage  only  by  its  low-arched  belfry,  a  little  neater  than  one 
would  expect  in  such  a  village  ;  perhaps  lately  built  by  the 
Puseyite  incumbent ;  *  and  beyond  the  church,  close  to  the 
sea,  are  two  fragments  of  a  border  war-tower,  standing  on 
their  circular  mound,  worn  on  its  brow  deep  into  edges  and 
furrows  by  the  feet  of  the  village  children.  On  the  bank  of 
moor,  which  forms  the  foreground,  are  a  few  cows,  the  carter's 
dog  barking  at  a  vixenish  one  :  the  milkmaid  is  feeding  an- 
other, a  gentle  white  one,  which  turns  its  head  to  her,  expect- 
ant of  a  handful  of  fresh  hay,  which  she  has  brought  for  it  in 
her  blue  apron,  fastened  up  round  her  waist ;  she  stands  with 
her  pail  on  her  head,  evidently  the  village  coquette,  for  she 
has  a  neat  bodice,  and  pretty  striped  petticoat  under  the  blue 
apron,  and  red  stockings.  Nearer  us,  the  cowherd,  barefooted, 
stands  on  a  piece  of  the  limestone  rock  (for  the  ground  is 
thistly  and  not  pleasurable  to  bare  feet) ; — whether  boy  or 
girl  we  are  not  sure  ;  it  may  be  a  boy,  with  a  girl's  worn-out 
bonnet  on,  or  a  girl  with  a  pair  of  ragged  trowsers  on  ;  prob- 
ably the  first,  as  the  old  bonnet  is  evidently  useful  to  keep  the 
sun  out  of  our  eyes  when  we  are  looking  for  strayed  cows 
among  the  moorland  hollowrs,  and  helps  us  at  present  to  watch 
(holding  the  bonnet's  edge  down)  the  quarrel  of  the  vixenish 
cow  with  the  dog,  which,  leaning  on  our  long  stick,  we  allow 
to  proceed  without  any  interference.  A  little  to  the  right  the 
hay  is  being  got  in,  of  which  the  milkmaid  has  just  taken  her 
apronful  to  the  white  cow  ;  but  the  hay  is  very  thin,  and  can- 
not well  be  raked  up  because  of  the  rocks  ;  we  must  glean  it 

*  "  Puseyism  "  was  unknown  in  the  days  when  this  drawing  was  made  ; 
but  the  kindly  and  helpful  influences  of  what  may  be  call  ecclesiastical 
sentiment,  which,  in  a  morbidly  exaggerated  condition,  forms  one  of  the 
principal  elements  of  "  Puseyism, v — I  use  this  word  regretfully,  no  other 
existing  which  will  serve  for  it, — had  been  known  and  felt  in  our  wild 
northern  districts  long  before. 


400 


THE  ELEMENTS  OF  DRA  WING. 


like  corn,  hence  the  smallness  of  our  stack  behind  the  willows; 
and  a  woman  is  pressing  a  bundle  of  it  hard  together,  kneel- 
ing against  the  rock's  edge,  to  carry  it  safely  to  the  hay-cart 
without  dropping  any.  Beyond  the  village  is  a  rocky  hill, 
deep  set  with  brushwood,  a  square  crag  or  two  of  limestone 
emerging  here  and  there,  with  pleasant  turf  on  their  brows, 
heaved  in  russet  and  mossy  mounds  against  the  sky,  which, 
clear  and  calm,  and  as  golden  as  the  moss,  stretches  down  be- 
hind it  towards  the  sea.  A  single  cottage  just  shows  its  roof 
over  the  edge  of  the  hill,  looking  seaward  ;  perhaps  one  of  the 
village  shepherds  is  a  sea  captain  now,  and  may  have  built  it 
there,  that  his  mother  may  first  see  the  sails  of  his  ship  when- 
ever it  runs  into  the  bay.  Then  under  the  hill,  and  beyond 
the  border  tower,  is  the  blue  sea  itself,  the  waves  flowing  in 
over  the  sand  in  long  curved  lines,  slowly  ;  shadows  of  cloud 
and  gleams  of  shallow  water  on  white  sand  alternating — miles 
away  ;  but  no  sail  is  visible,  not  one  fisherboat  on  the  beach, 
not  one  dark  speck  on  the  quiet  horizon.  Beyond  all  are  the 
Cumberland  mountains,  clear  in  the  sun,  with  rosy  light  on 
all  their  crags. 

I  should  think  the  reader  cannot  but  feel  the  kind  of  har- 
mony there  is  in  this  composition  ;  the  entire  purpose  of  the 
painter  to  give  us  the  impression  of  wild,  yet  gentle,  country 
life,  monotonous  as  the  succession  of  the  noiseless  waves,  pa- 
tient and  enduring  as  the  rocks  ;  but  peaceful,  and  full  of 
health  and  quiet  hope,  and  sanctified  by  the  pure  mountain 
air  and  baptismal  dew  of  heaven,  falling  softly  between  days 
of  toil  and  nights  of  innocence. 

All  noble  composition  of  this  kind  can  be  reached  only  by 
instinct :  you  cannot  set  yourself  to  arrange  such  a  subject ; 
you  may  see  it,  and  seize  it,  at  all  times,  but  never  laboriously 
invent  it.  And  your  power  of  discerning  what  is  best  in  ex- 
pression, among  natural  subjects,  depends  wholly  on  the  tem- 
per in  which  you  keep  your  own  mind ;  above  all,  on  your 
living  so  much  alone  as  to  allow  it  to  become  acutely  sensitive 
in  its  own  stillness.  The  noisy  life  of  modern  days  is  wholly 
incompatible  with  any  true  perception  of  natural  beauty.  If 
you  go  down  into  Cumberland  by  the  railroad,  live  in  some 


ON  COLOUR  AND  COMPOSITION 


401 


frequented  hotel,  and  explore  the  hills  with  merry  companions, 
however  much  you  may  enjoy  your  tour  or  their  conversation, 
depend  upon  it  you  will  never  choose  so  much  as  one  pictorial 
subject  rightly  ;  you  will  not  see  into  the  depth  of  any.  But 
take  knapsack  and  stick,  walk  towards  the  hills  by  short  day's 
journeys — ten  or  twelve  miles  a  day — taking  a  week  from  some 
starting-place  sixty  or  seventy  miles  away :  sleep  at  the  pretty 
little  wayside  inns,  or  the  rough  village  ones  ;  then  take  the 
hills  as  they  tempt  you,  following  glen  or  shore  as  your  eye 
glances  or  your  heart  guides,  wholly  scornful  of  local  fame  or 
fashion,  and  of  everything  which  it  is  the  ordinary  traveller's 
duty  to  see  or  pride  to  do.  Never  force  yourself  to  admire 
anything  when  you  are  not  in  the  humour  ;  but  never  force 
yourself  away  from  what  you  feel  to  be  lovely,  in  search  of 
anything  better  :  and  gradually  the  deeper  scenes  of  the  natural 
world  will  unfold  themselves  to  you  in  still  increasing  fulness 
of  passionate  power  ;  and  your  difficulty  will  be  no  more  to 
seek  or  to  compose  subjects,  but  only  to  choose  one  from 
among  the  multitude  of  melodious  thoughts  with  which  you 
will  be  haunted,  thoughts  which  will  of  course  be  noble  or 
original  in  proportion  to  your  own  depth  of  character  and 
general  power  of  mind  :  for  it  is  not  so  much  by  the  consid- 
eration you  give  to  any  single  drawing,  as  by  the  previous 
discipline  of  your  powers  of  thought,  that  the  character 
of  your  composition  will  be  determined.  Simplicity  of  life 
will  make  you  sensitive  to  the  refinement  and  modesty  of 
scenery,  just  as  inordinate  excitement  and  pomp  of  daily  life 
will  make  you  enjoy  coarse  colours  and  affected  forms.  Habits 
of  patient  comparison  and  accurate  judgment  will  make  your 
art  precious,  as  they  will  make  your  actions  wise  ;  and  every 
increase  of  noble  enthusiasm  in  your  living  spirit  will  be 
measured  by  the  reflection  of  its  light  upon  the  works  of 
your  hands. 

Faithfully  yours, 

J.  RUSKIN. 


APPEIH)IX. 


THINGS  TO  BE  STUDIED. 

The  worst  danger  by  far,  to  which  a  solitary  student  is  ex- 
posed, is  that  of  liking  things  that  he  should  not.  It  is  not 
so  much  his  difficulties,  as  his  tastes,  which  he  must  set  him- 
self to  conquer  ;  and  although,  under  the  guidance  of  a  master, 
many  works  of  art  may  be  made  instructive,  which  are  only 
of  partial  excellence  (the  good  and  bad  of  them  being  duly 
distinguished),  his  safeguard,  as  long  as  he  studies  alone,  will 
be  in  allowing  himself  to  possess  only  things,  in  their  way,  so 
free  from  faults,  that  nothing  he  copies  in  them  can  seriously 
mislead  him,  and  to  contemplate  only  those  works  of  art  which 
he  knows  to  be  either  perfect  or  noble  in  their  errors.  I  will 
therefore  set  down  in  clear  order,  the  names  of  the  masters 
whom  you  may  safely  admire,  and  a  few  of  the  books  which 
you  may  safely  possess.  In  these  days  of  cheap  illustration, 
the  danger  is  always  rather  of  your  possessing  too  much  than 
too  little.  It  may  admit  of  some  question,  how  far  the  look- 
ing at  bad  art  may  set  off  and  illustrate  the  characters  of  the 
good  ;  but,  on  the  whole,  I  believe  it  is  best  to  live  always  on 
quite  wholesome  food,  and  that  our  taste  of  it  will  not  be  made 
more  acute  by  feeding,  however  temporarily,  on  ashes.  Of 
course  the  works  of  the  great  masters  can  only  be  serviceable 
to  the  student  after  he  has  made  considerable  progress  him- 
self. It  only  wastes  the  time  and  dulls  the  feelings  of  young 
persons,  to  drag  them  through  picture  galleries ;  at  least,  unless 
they  themselves  wish  to  look  at  particular  pictures.  Generally, 
young  people  only  care  to  enter  a  picture  gallery  when  there 
is  a  chance  of  getting  leave  to  run  a  race  to  the  other  end  of 


404 


APPENDIX. 


it ;  and  they  had  better  do  that  in  the  garden  below.  If, 
however,  they  have  any  real  enjoyment  of  pictures,  and  wTant 
to  look  at  this  one  or  that,  the  principal  point  is  never  to  dis- 
turb them  in  looking  at  what  interests  them,  and  never  to 
make  them  look  at  what  does  not.  Nothing  is  of  the  least 
use  to  young  people  (nor,  by  the  way,  of  much  use  to  old  ones), 
but  what  interests  them  ;  and  therefore,  though  it  is  of  great 
importance  to  put  nothing  but  good  art  into  their  possession, 
yet  when  they  are  passing  though  great  houses  or  galleries, 
they  should  be  allowed  to  look  precisely  at  what  pleases  them  : 
if  it  is  not  useful  to  them  as  art,  it  will  be  in  some  other  way  : 
and  the  healthiest  way  in  which  art  can  interest  them  is  when 
they  look  at  it,  not  as  art,  but  because  it  represents  something 
they  like  in  nature.  If  a  boy  has  had  his  heart  filled  by  the 
life  of  some  great  man,  and  goes  up  thirstily  to  a  Vandyck 
portrait  of  him,  to  see  what  he  was  like,  that  is  the  whole- 
somest  way  in  which  he  can  begin  the  study  of  portraiture  ;  if  he 
love  mountains,  and  dwell  on  a  Turner  drawing  because  he  sees 
in  it  a  likeness  to  a  Yorkshire  scar,  or  an  Alpine  pass,  that  is 
the  wholesomest  way  in  which  he  can  begin  the  study  of  land- 
scape ;  and  if  a  giiTs  mind  is  filled  with  dreams  of  angels  and 
saints,  and  she  pauses  before  an  Angelico  because  she  thinks 
it  must  surely  be  indeed  like  heaven,  that  is  the  wholesomest 
way  for  her  to  begin  the  study  of  religious  art. 

When,  however,  the  student  has  made  some  definite  prog- 
ress, and  every  picture  becomes  really  a  guide  to  him,  false 
or  true,  in  his  own  work,  it  is  of  great  importance  that  he 
should  never  so  much  as  look  at  bad  art ;  and  then,  if  the 
reader  is  willing  to  trust  me  in  the  matter,  the  following- 
advice  will  be  useful  to  him.  In  which,  with  his  permission, 
I  will  quit  the  indirect  and  return  to  the  epistolary  address, 
as  being  the  more  convenient. 

First,  in  Galleries  of  Pictures  : 

1.  You  may  look,  with  trust  in  their  being  always  right,  at 
Titian,  Veronese,  Tintoret,  Giorgione,  John  Bellini,  and  Velas- 
quez ;  the  authenticity  of  the  picture  being  of  course  estab- 
lished for  you  by  proper  authority. 

2.  You  may  look  with  admiration,  admitting,  however 


THINGS  TO  BE  STUDIED. 


405 


question  of  right  and  wrong,*  at  Van  Eyck,  Holbein,  Perugino, 
Francia,  Angelico,  Leonardo  da  Vinci,  Correggio,  Vandyck, 
Rembrandt,  Reynolds,  Gainsborough,  Turner,  and  the  modern 
Pre-Raphaelites.f  You  had  better  look  at  no  other  painters 
than  these,  for  you  run  a  chance,  otherwise,  of  being  led  far 
off  the  road,  or  into  grievous  faults,  by  some  of  the  other 
great  ones,  as  Michael  Angelo,  Raphael,  and  Rubens  ;  and  of 
being,  besides,  corrupted  in  taste  by  the  base  ones,  as  Murillo, 
Salvator,  Claude,  Gasper  Poussin,  Teniers,  and  such  others. 
You  may  look,  however,  for  examples  of  evil,  with  safe  univer- 
sality of  reprobation,  being  sure  that  everything  you  see  is 
bad,  at  Domenichino,  the  Caracci,  Bronzino,  and  the  figure 
pieces  of  Salvator. 

Among  those  named  for  study  under  question,  you  cannot 
look  too  much  at,  nor  grow  too  enthusiastically  fond  of,  An- 
gelico, Correggio,  Reynolds,  Turner,  and  the  Pre-Raphaelites  ; 
but,  if  you  find  yourself  getting  especially  fond  of  any  of  the 
others,  leave  off  looking  at  them,  for  you  must  be  going  wrong- 
some  way  or  other.  If,  for  instance,  you  begin  to  like  Rem- 
brandt or  Leonardo  especially,  you  are  losing  your  feeling  for 
colour ;  if  you  like  Van  Eyck  or  Perugino  especially,  you 
must  be  getting  too  fond  of  rigid  detail  ;  and  if  you  like 
Vandyck  or  Gainsborough  especially,  you  must  be  too  much 
attracted  by  gentlemanly  flimsiness. 

Secondly,  of  published,  or  otherwise  multiplied,  art,  such 
as  you  may  be  able  to  get  yourself,  or  to  see  at  private  houses 
or  in  shops,  the  works  of  the  following  masters  are  the  most 
desirable,  after  the  Turners,  Rembrandts,  and  Durers,  which 
I  have  asked  you  to  get  first : 

1.  Samuel  Prout. 

All  his  published  lithographic  sketches  are  of  the  greatest 
*  I  do  not  mean  necessarily  to  imply  inferiority  of  rank,  in  saying 
that  this  second  class  of  painters  have  questionable  qualities.  The  great- 
est men  have  often  many  faults,  and  sometimes  their  faults  are  a  part 
of  their  greatness ;  but  such  men  are  not,  of  course,  to  be  looked  upon 
by  the  student  with  absolute  implicitness  of  faith. 

t  Including  under  this  term,  John  Lewis,  and  William  Hunt  of  the 
Old  Water-colour,  who,  take  him  all  in  all,  is  the  best  painter  of  still 
life,  I  believe,  that  ever  existed. 


406 


APPENDIX. 


value,  wholly  unrivalled  in  power  of  composition,  and  in  love 
and  feeling  of  architectural  subject.  His  somewhat  man- 
nered linear  execution,  though  not  to  be  imitated  in  your  own 
sketches  from  Nature,  may  be  occasionally  copied,  for  disci- 
pline's sake,  with  great  advantage  ;  it  will  give  you  a  peculiar 
steadiness  of  hand,  not  quickly  attainable  in  any  other  way 
and  there  is  no  fear  of  your  getting  into  any  faultful  manner- 
ism as  long  as  you  cany  out  the  different  modes  of  more 
delicate  study  above  recommended. 

If  you  are  interested  in  architecture,  and  wish  to  make  it 
your  chief  study,  you  should  draw  much  from  photographs  of 
it ;  and  then  from  the  architecture  itself,  with  the  same  com- 
pletion of  detail  and  gradation,  only  keeping  the  shadows  of 
due  paleness,  in  photographs  they  are  always  about  four  times 
as  dark  as  they  ought  to  be  ;  and  treat  buildings  with  as 
much  care  and  love  as  artists  do  their  rock  foregrounds,  draw- 
ing all  the  moss  and  weeds,  and  stains  upon  them.  But  if, 
without  caring  to  understand  architecture,  you  merely  want 
the  picturesque  character  of  it,  and  to  be  able  to  sketch  it 
fast,  you  cannot  do  better  than  take  Prout  for  your  exclusive 
master ;  only  do  not  think  that  you  are  copying  Prout  by 
drawing  straight  lines  with  dots  at  the  end  of  them.  Get 
first  his  "Rhine,"  and  draw  the  subjects  that  have  most  hills, 
and  least  architecture  in  them,  with  chalk  on  smooth  paper, 
till  you  can  lay  on  his  broad  flat  tints,  and  get  his  gradations 
of  light,  which  are  very  wonderful ;  then  take  up  the  archi- 
tectural subjects  in  the  "  Rhine,"  and  draw  again  and  again 
the  groups  of  figures,  &c,  in  his  "Microcosm,"  and  "Les- 
sons on  Light  and  Shadow."  After  that,  proceed  to  copy 
the  grand  subjects  in  the  sketches  in  "Flanders  and  Ger- 
many ; "  or  in  "  Switzerland  and  Italy,"  if  you  cannot  get  the 
Flanders  ;  but  the  Switzerland  is  very  far  inferior.  Then 
work  from  Nature,  not  trying  to  Proutise  Nature,  by  break- 
ing smooth  buildings  into  rough  ones,  but  only  drawing  what 
you  see,  with  Prout's  simple  method  and  firm  lines.  Don't  copy 
his  coloured  works.  They  are  good,  but  not  at  all  equal  to 
his  chalk  and  pencil  drawings,  and  you  will  become  a  mere 
imitator,  and  a  very  feeble  imitator,  if  you  use  colour  at  all  in 


THINGS  TO  BE  STUDIED. 


407 


Prout's  method.  I  have  not  space  to  explain  why  this  is  so, 
it  would  take  a  long  piece  of  reasoning;  trust  me  for  the 
statement. 

2.  John  Lewis. 

His  sketches  in  Spain,  lithographed  by  himself,  are  very 
valuable.  Get  them,  if  you  can,  and  also  some  engravings 
(about  eight  or  ten,  I  think,  altogether)  of  wild  beasts,  exe- 
cuted by  his  own  hand  a  long  time  ago  ;  they  are  very 
precious  in  every  way.  The  series  of  the  "Alhambra"  is 
rather  slight,  and  few  of  the  subjects  are  lithographed  by  him- 
self ;  still  it  is  well  worth  having. 

But  let  no  lithographic  work  come  into  the  house,  if  you 
can  help  it,  nor  even  look  at  any,  except  Prout's,  and  those 
sketches  of  Lewis's. 

3.  George  Cruikshank. 

If  you  ever  happen  to  meet  writh  the  two  volumes  of 
"  Grimm's  German  Stories,"  which  wrere  illustrated  by  him 
long  ago,  pounce  upon  them  instantly ;  the  etchings  in  them 
are  the  finest  things,  next  to  Kembrandt's,  that,  as  far  as  I 
know,  have  been  done  since  etching  was  invented.  You  can- 
not look  at  them  too  much,  nor  copy  them  too  often. 

All  his  works  are  very  valuable,  though  disagreeable  when 
they  touch  on  the  worst  vulgarities  of  modern  life  ;  and  often 
much  spoiled  by  a  curiously  mistaken  type  of  face,  divided  so 
as  to  give  too  much  to  the  mouth  and  eyes,  and  leave  too  little 
for  forehead,  the  eyes  being  set  about  two  thirds  up,  instead 
of  at  half  the  height  of  the  head.  But  his  manner  of  work  is 
always  right ;  and  his  tragic  powrer,  though  rarely  developed, 
and  warped  by  habits  of  caricature,  is,  in  reality,  as  great  as 
his  grotesque  power. 

There  is  no  fear  of  his  hurting  your  taste,  as  long  as  your 
principal  work  lies  among  art  of  so  totally  different  a  charac- 
ter as  most  of  that  which  I  have  recommended  to  you  ;  and 
you  may,  therefore,  get  great  good  by  copying  almost  anything 
of  his  that  may  come  in  your  way ;  except  only  his  illustra- 
ions  lately  published  to  "Cinderella,"  and  "Jack  and  the 


408 


APPENDIX. 


Beanstalk/' and  "Tom  Thumb,"  which  are  much  over-labour* 
ed,  and  confused  in  line.  You  should  get  them,  but  do  not 
copy  them. 

4.  Alfred  Eethel. 

I  only  know  two  publications  by  him  ;  one,  the  "  Dance  of 
Death,"  with  text  by  Eeinick,  published  in  Leipsic,  but  to  be 
had  now  of  any  London  bookseller  for  the  sum,  I  believe,  of 
eighteen  pence,  and  containing  six  plates  full  of  instructive 
character  ;  the  other,  of  two  plates  only,  "Death  the  Avenger," 
and  "Death  the  Friend."  These  two  are  far  superior  to  the 
"  Todtentanz,"  and,  if  you  can  get  them,  will  be  enough  in 
themselves,  to  show  all  that  Rethel  can  teach  you.  If  you 
dislike  ghastly  subjects,  get  "Death  the  Friend"  only. 

5.  Bewick. 

The  execution  of  the  plumage  in  Bewick's  birds  is  the  most 
masterly  thing  ever  yet  done  in  wood-cutting  ;  it  is  just  worked 
as  Paul  Veronese  would  have  worked  in  wood,  had  he  taken 
to  it.  His  vignettes,  though  too  coarse  in  execution,  and 
vulgar  in  types  of  form,  to  be  good  copies,  show,  nevertheless, 
intellectual  power  of  the  highest  order  ;  and  there  are  pieces 
of  sentiment  in  them,  either  pathetic  or  satirical,  which  have 
never  since  been  equalled  in  illustrations  of  this  simple  kind  ; 
the  bitter  intensity  of  the  feeling  being  just  like  that  which 
characterises  some  of  the  leading  Pre-Raphaelites.  Bewick  is 
the  Burns  of  painting. 

6.  Blake. 

The  "  Book  of  Job,"  engraved  by  himself,  is  of  the  highest 
rank  in  certain  characters  of  imagination  and  expression  ;  in 
the  mode  of  obtaining  certain  effects  of  light  it  will  also  be  a 
very  useful  example  to  you.  In  expressing  conditions  of  glar- 
ing and  flickering  light,  Blake  is  greater  than  Rembrandt. 

7.  Richter. 

I  have  already  told  you  what  to  guard  against  in  looking  at 
his  works.  I  am  a  little  doubtful  whether  I  have  done  well  in 
including  them  in  this  catalogue  at  all ;  but  the  fancies  in  them 
are  so  pretty  and  numberless,  that  I  must  risk,  for  their  sak§ 


THINGS  TO  BE  STUDIED. 


409 


the  chance  of  hurting  you  a  little  in  judgment  of  style.  If 
you  want  to  make  presents  of  story-books  to  children,  his  are 
the  best  you  can  now  get. 

8.  Eossetti. 

An  edition  of  Tennyson,  lately  published,  contains  wood- 
cuts from  drawings  by  Rossetti  and  other  chief  Pre-Raphaelite 
masters.  They  are  terribly  spoiled  in  the  cutting,  and  gene- 
rally the  best  part,  the  expression  of  feature,  entirely  lost ;  * 
still  they  are  full  of  instruction,  and  cannot  be  studied  too 
closely.  But  observe,  respecting  these  wood-cuts,  that  if  you 
have  been  in  the  habit  of  looking  at  much  spurious  work,  in 
which  sentiment,  action,  and  style  are  borrowed  or  artificial, 
you  will  assuredly  be  offended  at  first  by  all  genuine  work, 
which  is  intense  in  feeling.  Genuine  art,  which  is  merely 
art,  such  as  Veronese's  or  Titian's,  may  not  offend  you,  though 
the  chances  are  that  you  will  not  care  about  it :  but  genuine 
works  of  feeling,  such  as  Maude  and  Aurora  Leigh  in  poetry, 
or  the  grand  Pre-Raphaelite  designs  in  painting,  are  sure  to 
offend  you  ;  and  if  you  cease  to  work  hard,  and  persist  in 
looking  at  vicious  and  false  art,  they  will  continue  to  offend 
you.  It  will  be  well,  therefore,  to  have  one  type  of  entirely 
false  art,  in  order  to  know  what  to  guard  against.  Flaxman's 
outlines  to  Dante  contain,  I  think,  examples  of  almost  every 
kind  of  falsehood  and  feebleness  which  it  is  possible  for  a 
trained  artist,  not  base  in  thought,  to  commit  or  admit,  botli 
in  design  and  execution.  Base  or  degraded  choice  of  subject, 
such  as  you  will  constantly  find  in  Teniers  and  others  of  the 
Dutch  painters,  I  need  not,  I  hope,  warn  you  against ;  you 
will  simply  turn  away  from  it  in  disgust ;  while  mere  bad  or 
feeble  drawing,  which  makes  mistakes  in  every  direction  at 
once,  cannot  teach  you  the  particular  sort  of  educated  fallacy 

*  This  is  especially  the  case  in  the  St.  Cecily,  Rossetti' s  first  illustra- 
tion to  the  "  palace  of  art,"  which  would  have  been  the  best  in  the  book 
had  it  been  well  engraved.  The  whole  work  should  be  taken  up  again, 
and  done  by  line  engraving,  perfectly  ;  and  wholly  from  Pre-Raphaelite 
designs;  with  which  no  other  modern  work  can  bear  the  least  compari- 
son. 


410 


APPENDIX. 


in  question.  But,  in  these  designs  of  Flaxman's,  you  have 
gentlemanly  feeling,  and  fair  knowledge  of  anatomy,  and  firm 
setting  down  of  lines,  all  applied  in  the  foolishest  and  worst 
possible  way  ;  you  cannot  have  a  more  finished  example  of 
learned  error,  amiable  want  of  meaning,  and  bad  drawing 
with  a  steady  hand.*  Retsch's  outlines  have  more  real  ma- 
terial in  them  than  Flaxman's,  occasionally  showing  true  fancy 
and  power  ;  in  artistic  principle  they  are  nearly  as  bad,  and  in 
taste  worse.  All  outlines  from  statuary,  as  given  in  works  on 
classical  art,  will  be  very  hurtful  to  you  if  you  in  the  least  like 
them  ;  and  nearly  all  finished  line  engravings.  Some  particu- 
lar prints  I  could  name  which  possess  instructive  qualities, 
but  it  would  take  too  long  to  distinguish  them,  and  the  best 
way  is  to  avoid  line  engravings  of  figures  altogether.  If  you 
happen  to  be  a  rich  person,  possessing  quantities  of  them,  and 
if  you  are  fond  of  the  large  finished  prints  from  Raphael,  Cor- 
reggio,  &c,  it  is  wholly  impossible  that  you  can  make  any 

*  The  praise  I  have  given  incidentally  to  Flaxman's  sculpture  in  the 
"Seven  Lamps,"  and  elsewhere,  refers  wholly  to  his  studies  from  Nature, 
and  simple  groups  in  marble,  which  were  always  good  and  interesting. 
Still,  I  have  overrated  him,  even  in  this  respect ;  and  it  is  generally  to 
be  remembered  that,  in  speaking  of  artists  whose  works  I  cannot  be  sup- 
posed to  have  specially  studied,  the  errors  I  fall  into  will  always  be  on 
the  side  of  praise.  For,  of  course,  praise  is  most  likely  to  be  given 
when  the  thing  praised  is  above  one's  knowledge  ;  and,  therefore,  as  our 
knowledge  increases,  such  things  may  be  found  less  praiseworthy  than 
we  thought.  But  blame  can  only  be  justly  given  when  the  thing  blamed 
is  below  one's  level  of  sight ;  and,  practically,  I  never  do  blame  any- 
thing until  I  have  got  well  past  it,  and  am  certain  that  there  is  demon- 
strable falsehood  in  it,  I  believe,  therefore,  all  my  blame  to  be  wholly 
trustworthy,  having  never  yet  had  occasion  to  repent  of  one  depreciatory 
word  that  I  have  ever  written,  while  I  have  often  found  that,  with  re- 
spect to  things  I  had  not  time  to  study  closely,  I  was  led  too  far  by  sud- 
den admiration,  helped,  perhaps,  by  peculiar  associations,  or  other  de- 
ceptive accidents  ;  and  this  the  more,  because  I  never  care  to  check  an 
expression  of  delight,  thinking  the  chances  are,  that,  even  if  mistaken, 
it  will  do  more  good  than  harm  ;  but  I  weigh  every  word  of  blame  with 
scrupulous  caution.  I  have  sometimes  erased  a  strong  passage  of  blamo 
from  second  editions  of  my  books ;  but  this  was  only  when  I  found  it 
offended  the  reader  without  convincing  him,  never  because  I  repented 
of  it  myself. 


THINGS  TO  BE  STUDIED. 


411 


progress  in  knowledge  of  real  art  till  you  have  sold  them  all 
— or  burnt  them,  which  would  be  a  greater  benefit  to  the 
world.  I  hope  that  some  day,  true  and  noble  engravings  will 
be  made  from  the  few  pictures  of  the  great  schools,  which  the 
restorations  undertaken  by  the  modern  managers  of  foreign 
galleries  may  leave  us  ;  but  the  existing  engravings  have 
nothing  whatever  in  common  with  the  good  in  the  works  they 
profess  to  represent,  and  if  you  like  them,  you  like  in  the 
originals  of  them  hardly  anything  but  their  errors. 

Finally,  your  judgment  will  be,  of  course,  much  affected  by 
your  taste  in  literature.  Indeed,  I  know  many  persons  who 
have  the  purest  taste  in  literature,  and  yet  false  taste  in  art, 
and  it  is  a  phenomenon  which  puzzles  me  not  a  little  :  but  I 
have  never  known  any  one  with  false  taste  in  books,  and  true 
taste  in  pictures.  It  is  also  of  the  greatest  importance  to  you, 
not  only  for  art's  sake,  but  for  all  kinds  of  sake,  in  these  days 
of  book  deluge,  to  keep  out  of  the  salt  swamps  of  literature, 
and  live  on  a  rocky  island  of  your  own,  with  a  spring  and  a 
lake  in  it,  pure  and  good.  I  cannot,  of  course,  suggest  the 
choice  of  your  library  to  you,  every  several  mind  needs  differ- 
ent books ;  but  there  are  some  books  which  we  all  need,  and 
assuredly,  if  you  read  Homer,*  Plato,  iEschylus,  Herodotus, 
Dante,*)-  Shakspeare,  and  Spenser,  as  much  as  you  ought,  you 
will  not  require  wide  enlargement  of  shelves  to  right  and  left 
of  them  for  purposes  of  perpetual  study.  Among  modern 
books,  avoid  generally  magazine  and  review  literature.  Some- 
times it  may  contain  a  useful  abridgement  or  a  wholesome  piece 
of  criticism  ;  but  the  chances  are  ten  to  one  it  will  either  waste 
your  time  or  mislead  you.  If  you  want  to  understand  any  sub- 
ject whatever,  read  the  best  book  upon  it  you  can  hear  of  ; 
not  a  review  of  the  book.    If  you  don't  like  the  first  book  you 

*  Chapman's,  if  not  the  original. 

f  Carey's  or  Cayley's,  if  not  the  original.  I  do  not  know  which  are 
the  best  translations  of  Plato.  Herodotus  and  iEschylus  can  only  be 
read  in  the  original.  It  may  seem  strange  that  I  name  books  like  these 
for  "  beginners :  "  but  all  the  greatest  books  contain  food  for  all  ages  ; 
and  an  intelligent  and  rightly  bred  youth  or  girl  ought  to  enjoy  much, 
even  in  Plato,  by  the  time  they  are  fifteen  or  sixteen. 


412 


APPENDIX. 


try,  seek  for  another  ;  but  do  not  hope  ever  to  understand  the 
subject  without  pains,  by  a  reviewer's  help.  Avoid  especially 
that  class  of  literature  which  has  a  knowing  tone ;  it  is  the 
most  poisonous  of  all.  Every  good  book,  or  piece  of  book,  is 
full  of  admiration  and  awe  ;  it  may  contain  firm  assertion  or 
stern  satire,  but  it  never  sneers  coldly,  nor  asserts  haughtily, 
and  it  always  leads  you  to  reverence  or  love  something  with 
your  whole  heart.  It  is  not  always  easy  to  distinguish  the 
satire  of  the  venomous  race  of  books  from  the  satire  of  the 
noble  and  pure  ones  ;  but  in  general  you  may  notice  that  th<j 
cold-blooded  Crustacean  and  Batrachian  books  will  sneer  at 
sentiment ;  and  the  warm-blooded,  human  books,  at  sin.  Then, 
in  general,  the  more  you  can  restrain  your  serious  reading  to 
reflective  or  lyric  poetry,  history,  and  natural  history,  avoiding 
fiction  and  the  drama,  the  healthier  your  mind  will  become. 
Of  modern  poetry  keep  to  Scott,  Wordsworth,  Keats,  Crabbe, 
Tennyson,  the  two  Brownings,  Lowell,  Longfellow,  and  Cov- 
entry Patmore,  whose  "  Angel  in  the  House  "  is  a  most  finished 
piece  of  writing,  and  the  sweetest  analysis  we  possess  of  quiet 
modern  domestic  feeling;  while  Mrs.  Browning's  "Aurora 
Leigh  "  is,  as  far  as  I  know,  the  greatest  poem  which  the  cen- 
tury has  produced  in  any  language.  Cast  Coleridge  at  once 
aside,  as  sickly  and  useless  ;  and  Shelley  as  shallow  and  ver- 
bose ;  Byron,  until  your  taste  is  fully  formed,  and  you  are  able 
to  discern  the  magnificence  in  him  from  the  wrong.  Never 
read  bad  or  common  poetry,  nor  write  any  poetry  yourself ; 
there  is,  perhaps,  rather  too  much  than  too  little  in  the  world 
already. 

Of  reflective  prose,  read  chiefly  Bacon,  Johnson,  and  Helps. 
Carlyle  is  hardly  to  be  named  as  a  writer  for  "  beginners," 
because  his  teaching,  though  to  some  of  us  vitally  necessary 
may  to  others  be  hurtful.  If  you  understand  and  like  him, 
read  him ;  if  he  offends  you,  you  are  not  yet  ready  for  him, 
and  perhaps  may  never  be  so ;  at  all  events,  give  him  up,  as 
you  would  sea-bathing  if  you  found  it  hurt  you,  till  you  are 
stronger.  Of  fiction,  read  Sir  Charles  Grandison,  Scott's 
novels,  Miss  Edgeworth's,  and,  if  you  are  a  young  lady, 
Madame  de  Genlis',  the  French  Miss  Edgeworth;  making 


THINGS  TO  BE  STUDIED. 


413 


these,  I  mean,  your  constant  companions.  Of  course  you 
must,  or  will  read  other  books  for  amusement,  once  or  twice  ; 
but  you  will  find  that  these  have  an  element  of  perpetuity  in 
them,  existing  in  nothing  else  of  their  kind  :  while  their  pe- 
culiar quietness  and  repose  of  manner  will  also  be  of  the  great- 
est value  in  teaching  you  to  feel  the  same  characters  in  art. 
Read  little  at  a  time,  trying  to  feel  interest  in  little  things, 
and  reading  not  so  much  for  the  sake  of  the  story  as  to  get  ac- 
quainted with  the  pleasant  people  into  whose  company  these 
writers  bring  you.  A  common  book  will  often  give  you  much 
amusement,  but  it  is  only  a  noble  book  which  will  give  you 
dear  friends.  Remember  also  that  it  is  of  less  importance  to 
you  in  yo ur  earlier  years,  that  the  books  you  read  should  be 
clever,  than  that  they  should  be  right.  I  do  not  mean  oppres- 
sively or  repulsively  instructive  ;  but  that  the  thoughts  they 
express  should  be  just,  and  the  feelings  they  excite  generous. 
It  is  not  necessary  for  you  to  read  the  wittiest  or  the  most 
suggestive  books  :  it  is  better,  in  general,  to  hear  what  is  al- 
ready known,  and  may  be  simply  said.  Much  of  the  literature 
of  the  present  day,  though  good  to  be  read  by  persons  of  ripe 
age,  has  a  tendency  to  agitate  rather  than  confirm,  and  leaves 
its  readers  too  frequently  in  a  helpless  or  hopeless  indignation, 
the  worst  possible  state  into  which  the  mind  of  youth  can  be 
thrown.  It  may,  indeed,  become  necessary  for  you,  as  you 
advance  in  life,  to  set  your  hand  to  things  that  need  to  be 
altered  in  the  world,  or  apply  your  heart  chiefly  to  what  must 
be  pitied  in  it,  or  condemned  ;  but,  for  a  young  person,  the 
safest  temper  is  one  of  reverence,  and  the  safest  place  one  of 
obscurity.  Certainly  at  present,  and  perhaps  through  all  your 
life,  your  teachers  are  wisest  when  they  make  you  content  in 
quiet  virtue,  and  that  literature  and  art  are  best  for  you  which 
point  out,  in  common  life  and  familiar  things,  the  objects  for 
hopeful  labour,  and  for  humble  love. 


